Hon Jim Anderton

Minister of Agriculture, Minister for Biosecurity
Minister of Fisheries, Minister of Forestry
Associate Minister of Health
Associate Minister for Tertiary Education

Progressive Leader

September 2007

Tackling BZP important for New Zealand

Minister in charge of the Government’s drug policy Jim Anderton today defended his legislation to ban BZP and related piperizine party pills against those such as the Green party who say there is not enough evidence for a ban.

“The Greens and others say they believe all drug policy should be based on evidence, well hello, we’ve got the evidence to ban BZP.

“But now they say – it’s not enough evidence, even though New Zealand now has probably one of the most substantial bodies of research on BZP in the world. Not only that, but the Expert Advisory Committee on Drugs found there was enough to support a ban.

“They said there was clear evidence that regulation was not adequate to deal with the threat posed by party pills, and there was an opportunity to reduce that risk by banning them.

“We must take a precautionary approach. We have enough harmful legal drugs to control by regulation already. Alcohol and tobacco cause far more harm than any other drugs in New Zealand… why add another?”

He said the Greens were not consistent in their call for strong regulation of BZP rather than banning party pills.

“BZP was first introduced into this country as a dietary supplement (or complementary medicine by another name) and we all know where the Greens stand on complementary medicines – no or very little regulation and have opposed this government’s legislation to clean up this area all the way. This is probably their real position on BZP party pills as well -I say the Greens should come clean.”

ENDS

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