“The Victorian Gambling and Casino Control Commission will move from its Richmond office as fears grow for staff after a rise in anti-Semitic messages, and assaults and verbal abuse from users of the nearby injecting room.”  Anthony Templeton Herald Sun Feb 27, 2025.

 ‘Oh diddums, how terrible what the poor employees of VGCCC must put up with during their working day, but hang on, their working days are predominately at home, aren’t they?

Unlike the residents of Richmond, they only need to expose themselves to the reality of drugs spasmodically. The rest of the Richmond residents deal with this issue 24/7 without respite.

Located right next door, within 15 meters of the Richmond North Primary School, things are so bad locals have advised the CAA that children at this Primary School are exposed to addicts engaged in sex acts from their classroom window at the back of the MSIR and Prostitutes are a common site plying their wares in the vicinity of the MSIR.

Moreover, the children are exposed to experiences no child should endure because the Medically Supervised Injecting Room MSIR, or more correctly, the Safe Drug Injecting Room, ‘safe’, meaning beyond the Law, not the illicit product drug users inject, so close to the school the children cannot avoid interaction with drug users.

The absolute hypocrisy of Government is laid bare, with the residents and traders of Richmond left holding the bag and suffering the impact of the Richmond Injecting room without respite. At the same time, the Government packs up the bags of the VGCCC to relocate it to a more salubrious area away from the disgusting behaviours and lawlessness of Richmond.

Moving the VGCCC because of the Injecting room nearby, some 500 meters or ½  mile away, and the environment in the vicinity of the MSIR, which is overrun with addicts and anti-social behaviour, threatening the safety of VGCCC staff, is an outright admission that the Government has failed the community.

500 meters from the VGCCC compared to 15 meters for a Primary school and 20 meters from residents’ homes. It would be much more practical to repurpose or move the injecting room. It would also be substantially cheaper than moving a Government Department.

The move will be costly and disrupt the operations of the Department. With the State under financial pressure, it would be a whole lot smarter to save an expensive move and use those funds to repurpose the injecting room into an outreach drug treatment facility or a drug triage centre to manage addicts.

The government has already spent $14m on upgrading security, which is not good enough for the VGCCC. They would instead be relocated to the CBD.

VGCCC chief executive Annette Kimmitt, as reported in the HS, said,

“Feedback from staff (including our most recent People Matter survey) reflects growing fear for personal safety while at work and when travelling to and from the office,” she said in the letter.

“We continue to witness and experience other anti-social and criminal activity, including drug and alcohol-related violence, drug dealing and other intimidating behaviour.

“Colleagues have witnessed the brazen exchange of cash for drugs, people injecting drugs near the building and subsequently large numbers of dangerously discarded syringes.”

Ms Kimmitt said increasing anti-Semitic material – such as graffiti, posters and stickers – was also creating an unsafe environment.”

To ‘add insult to injury’, Ms Kimmitt was also reported as saying.

..“Our relocation will impact the many hardworking small businesses, particularly the food outlets that rely on our foot traffic,” she said.

To rub salt into the wound the condescending sympathy expressed by Kimmitt is well ‘beyond the pale’.

In a State ‘crying poor’, to spend the money on relocating an entire Government Department simply because the vicinity of their offices is not to their liking is an absolute disgrace.

We guestimate that this move will cost the taxpayers $100’s of Millions of dollars by the time the new digs have a bespoke fit-out, all the VGCCC technology hardware is relocated or replaced, and all the other costs incurred, including the properties to be vacated or occupied.

We note that Ms. Kimmitt was not forthcoming about a budget for the exercise.

Yarra Mayor Stephen Jolly also weighed into the debate, claiming a dedicated plan to revitalise the area was needed, with more police, financial support for existing businesses and a plan to attract new traders.

“What we are seeing is a ghetto in the making, and we have to stop it; a Disneyland for drug users has been created,” he said.

Unfortunately, the good Mayor is promoting the relocation of the MSIR; however, relocating, an easy option, will not contribute to the lowering of the number of users who die and the disquiet that the community suffers. It will be suffered elsewhere with another community.

There is no good place to have an MSIR. However, there are plenty of places for a Drug user’s resource where the primary function is to ensure their addiction is addressed, not just facilitate their continued addiction, the function of the MSIR.

It is inevitable that wherever it is relocated, the problems will only follow.

Closing this MSIR and re-allocating the MSIR operating costs to bespoke drug management centres should be the strategy to clean up Richmond. A zero-tolerance approach by saturation Policing will encourage users to vacate the area and, without the magnate of an MSIR elsewhere, will move back to their normal local. Dispersing the addicts will damage the Dealers who are the major and only beneficiary of attracting users to one location.

Although there is a myth that surrounds the MSIR that it reduces deaths from overdoses, the Coroners Annual Reports paints a different picture.

The latest Coroners figures reveal that in Victoria, there were 601 deaths in 2024, the highest recorded spike in deaths since the 550 recorded in 2022, two years after the MSIR was opened.

So, the MSIR has had no appreciable impact on reducing deaths – it is a failed strategy.

To rely on MSIR figures is problematic as it uses figures for the Local Government Area, which is disingenuous because the majority of the drug users frequenting the MSIR and its surrounds are not locals but from other areas. Many of the people overdosing at the MSIR or vicinity are transported to hospital, where they are declared dead. Therefore, the place of death is registered outside the Yarra LGA, fudging the figures.

Victoria spends Millions of dollars annually to reduce road deaths with some success. However, the educational approach cannot succeed without parallel initiatives to ensure that our road infrastructure and vehicles are safe and road laws are enforced.

During 2023 in this State, the road toll was 282, and with 601 Drug overdose deaths in the same period, over twice as many lives were lost to drugs. Yet expenditure on addressing the drug problem is so minimal as to be close to non-existent.

Governments are ignoring the drug problem, hoping it will go away, influenced by those who promote illicit drug use as a recreational activity and any intervention as a breach of the freedom of choice. That same twisted logic would remove all speed restrictions and leave vehicle speeds to the driver’s freedom of choice.

The most disturbing part of the death comparisons is the value our governments put on a life.

A drug user’s life is worthless compared to a road user.

It is well past time that the government takes some responsibility for the drug epidemic and invokes strategies that have an impact, not just indulge in occasional talkfests.

The current cost of the drug epidemic, and history shows it will continue to spiral downward, should be motivation enough to take serious action, but not, as governments continue to be swayed by the failed Harm Minimization strategies without the supporting fragments of the Three Pillars strategies.

It is past time that involuntary treatment was introduced as a cornerstone of the approach to drug use, and while the opponents to such a move scream, ‘What about the person’s rights?’.

Their right to life should transcend their other rights; they can have them back when they are well.