Doctors, police slam planned reform POLICE and doctors have slammed the Andrews government for announcing a plan to scrap public drunkenness laws without any detail on how violent cases will be managed.<\/p>\n
The report says police should be used as a \u201clast resort\u201d when dealing with drunks with low-level cases sent home or to friends with the help of health services. High-level cases should be taken to hospital.<\/p>\n
It also recommends \u201cstrict limits to police powers\u201d be introduced.<\/p>\n
AMA Victoria president Julian Rait said the changes would have to be managed carefully to ensure emergency departments weren\u2019t overwhelmed , given doctors were already dealing with growing mental health cases.<\/p>\n
Mr Gatt said police feared they would be used as a \u201ctaxi service\u201d without adequate funding, however, with the government\u2019s promised $16 million for trials falling short.<\/p>\n
\u201cWho will respond to triple-0 calls for assistance from the community when intoxicated people are putting them at risk?\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
\u201cFor decades police have fought to remove alcohol-fuelled violence from our streets. We cannot compromise on this work by making rash decisions .\u201d<\/p>\n
Victoria\u2019s Aboriginal Executive Council chair Esme Bamblett said police would soon be \u201cfree\u201d from enforcing an \u201cantiquated harmful law\u201d<\/p>\n
\u2014 under which an average of 8269 people a year are charged \u2014 and that the public stood ready to \u201cbuild the health and support response for vulnerable intoxicated people\u201d .<\/p>\n
\u201cWe will spend the next two years working closely with Aboriginal communities, health experts and other stakeholders, including police, to address any concerns and ensure the public health model provides the care and support required.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis includes establishing trial sites that will be tested and evaluated before the repeal takes effect.\u201d<\/p>\n
<\/a>For further information<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Doctors, police slam planned reform POLICE and doctors have slammed the Andrews government for announcing a plan to scrap public drunkenness laws without any detail on how violent cases will be managed. The report says police should be used as a \u201clast resort\u201d when dealing with drunks with low-level cases sent home or to friends […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"","ast-site-content-layout":"default","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","ast-disable-related-posts":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"default","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ast-content-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"footnotes":"","_wp_rev_ctl_limit":""},"categories":[33],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2721","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-dalgorno-monitoring-alcohol"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.dalgarnoinstitute.org.au\/wp_site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2721","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.dalgarnoinstitute.org.au\/wp_site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.dalgarnoinstitute.org.au\/wp_site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.dalgarnoinstitute.org.au\/wp_site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.dalgarnoinstitute.org.au\/wp_site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2721"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.dalgarnoinstitute.org.au\/wp_site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2721\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.dalgarnoinstitute.org.au\/wp_site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2721"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.dalgarnoinstitute.org.au\/wp_site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2721"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.dalgarnoinstitute.org.au\/wp_site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2721"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}