Greens and Labor ‘deal’ on ‘Ice’ - Debnam

Peter Debnam's Blog - Wednesday, 14th March 2007

Any Member of Parliament who thinks we should de-criminalise drugs, including ‘Ice’, should take a good hard look at themselves, do the community a favour, and resign.

I have been in the NSW Parliament for thirteen years. And in that time, I have heard some pretty stupid ideas. But when the Green’s Lee Rhiannon yesterday suggested we should consider decriminalising ‘Ice’, she went to the top of the list.

Once upon a time, the Greens were about the environment. But over time they have abused this platform and public goodwill towards the environmental cause, to peddle dangerous policies and social experiments that do not enjoy community support.

Decriminalisation of drug use, increased taxes on business, liberalisation of adoption laws, shutting down the coal industry, softening the Summary Offences Act, are just some of the policies the Greens are promoting at this election.

The Liberal and National Parties cannot support the Greens policies and will not support the Greens with preferences, but Labor will.

And beyond this, the Greens have shown themselves again to be nothing more than a stalking horse for the Labor Party, exchanging preferences, despite Labor’s plans to build a desalination plant at Kurnell.

There is a good reason why the Greens say they will never preference the Liberal Party. And that is because we will never support their reckless policies for social experiments, that run counter to the values that we believe create stronger communities.

The Liberal Party will never support decriminalisation of ‘Ice’, and no party should support ANY party that does. Our position is clear, Morris Iemma and Labor have a lot of explaining to do!

Today I have launched our straight forward plan for a cleaner, greener NSW.

The cornerstone of our plan is to establish a $300 million Clean NSW Fund from the sale of the NSW Waste Service. The fund will finance projects aimed at:

• tackling climate change by supporting renewable energy, in particular solar,

• reducing energy demand with smart meters in homes,

• cleaning up our National Parks and waterways,

• working with landowners to foster biodiversity, and

• getting serious about recycling and cleaner waste management.  

These policies are in addition to our plans to tackle the water crisis with recycling and stormwater harvesting, rather than Labor’s environmentally damaging and expensive desalination plant.

On March 24, we need to vote to fix the environment in NSW. And our plan will do just that.

But a vote for the Greens, and Labor who supports them, is a vote to support social experiments like drug liberalisation, as well as higher taxes and going even softer on crime.

So at this election, don’t reward Labor and don’t allow your vote to support the Greens dangerous policies, that place our community at risk.

Regards,

Peter Debnam

PS. In case you missed it yesterday, Benny Elias recounted to the media that he had invited Morris Iemma to an NRL Match on March 24, Benny said “I have invited .. the Premier here .. on the 24th.  He said he’d probably have a lot of other celebrations on that night”. How cocky can you get.

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