A submission by the Australian Industry Group to the Parliamentary Joint Committee on Law Enforcement’s inquiry into ice or crystal methamphetamine reveals that ice use is endemic in blue collar industries.
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An article by Tim Dick for The Age stresses that the decades-long war on drugs can be won by lifting the prohibition against drugs and legalise drug use.
Everyone knows that methamphetamine or ice has devastating effects on one’s health, but that doesn’t seem to be stopping many employees from using it to get ahead of everybody else in the workplace. An article on News.com.au features two workers who have admitted to using ice to boost work performance, and their stories can be quite alarming.
It has been decades since the idea of workplace drug testing was introduced, but it remains a difficult issue. While more and more employers are actually implementing workplace drug testing programs, many issues and questions continue to hound the practice to this day.
In most cases, workplace drug testing is unquestionably necessary in industries that use heavy equipment. These, after all, are high-risk fields that could easily turn into disaster areas in the blink of an eye because of a driver or a heavy machinery operator or a pilot working while impaired by alcohol or drugs, or both. But what about other industries that aren’t as safety-sensitive? Should workplace drug testing be introduced to all industries, and sack those who test positive for drugs and alcohol?
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In a podcast for Gizmodo Australia, Rose Eveleth brings up the idea of taking a future drug that will help you never sleep again, and whether or not people would actually consider taking it. Eveleth discussed the topic James Hughes, executive director of the Institute for Ethics and Emerging Technologies and Nancy Kress, author of the sci-fi trilogy Beggars in Spain, which is about people genetically engineered to be unable to sleep.
The 2015 Operation AUSTRANS blitz has bagged more drug-driving workers than it had in 2014.
According to new figures released by the Australia New Zealand Policing Advisory Agency (ANZPAA), the month-long AUSTRANS campaign successfully apprehended 190 heavy vehicle drivers who tested positive to drugs or alcohol. The figure marks an increase from last year’s catch, which was pegged at 172.
The blitz, which was a joint operation between Australian and New Zealand police with the cooperation of road and OHS agencies, also intercepted 323 people driving heavy vehicles without a licence, pinpointed 3271 work diary breaches, spotted 1518 improperly restrained loads, and caught 145 trucks with speed-tampering devices.
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The rising incidence of ice use at HMAS Sterling has forced the Australian Defence Force to consider making the sailors assigned in the said naval base undergo hair drug testing, says Nick Butterly in a report for The West Australian.
The policy of West Australian police to not test drink drivers for drugs needs to be changed, and that the WA Government should create a specific “combined impairment” charge for those who drive under the influence of both drugs and alcohol, according to a group of road safety researchers.