The post New Zealand Moves Toward Roadside Drug Tests For Meth And Weed appeared first on High Times.
A big push is on in New Zealand for a bill that would give police the power to conduct roadside saliva tests for methamphetamine, ecstasy (MDMA) and cannabis. The public face of the campaign to pass the legislation for roadside drug tests is Malcolm Barnett, who in 2005 lost his 18-year-old stepdaughter to a road crash with a driver who was wasted on meth, or “P,” as they call it in New Zealand.
The Background
A meth-fueled motorist drove 300 meters down the wrong side of the road before fatally slamming into a car driven by a young woman named Krystal Bennett. The motorist was later convicted of manslaughter. Bennett’s stepfather, Malcolm Barnett, is adamant that roadside drug tests could have prevented his stepdaughter’s death. He urged legislators to “get something done… give police the power to do it.”
Kiwi cops can already carry out a “compulsory impairment test,” or CIT, on motorists suspected of being intoxicated. The saliva test—using something similar to the “potalyzer” device being developed here in the United States—would give them ability to chemically determine what a motorist has been using, and how much.
There are a few problems with this. One obvious one is that if someone is barreling down the road against the traffic for 300 meters, a test to see if the motorist is intoxicated is a little superfluous. But a more insidious problem is the way cannabis is being thrown in with methamphetamine. The write-up on the legislative push by the New Zealand news site Stuff even includes a public service video by the NZ Transport Agency warning against driving while high—on pot. It portrays