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Drugs now `the norm' in city lifeBy TREVOR PADDENBURG
11sep05
ILLICIT drugs are no longer the domain of a shady few in WA. Everyone from lawyers to labourers is going on weekend binges lasting days at a time.
Research shows that one in three young people is taking illicit drugs. And health experts warn ecstasy and amphetamines are now so common they have become "the norm".
Royal Perth Hospital toxicologist Frank Daly, who treats overdose victims weekly, said illicit drug use was rocketing among people from all walks of life.
"It's not the junkies or the prostitutes. It's everyone from lawyers to labourers, young professionals, travel agents, accountants, tradies and uni graduates," Dr Daly said.
Chemical Kate's life of ups and downs
By TREVOR PADDENBURG
11sep05
IT'S 8.45pm on Friday and Kate is at a friend's house, sipping white wine and racking up her first line of speed.
Over the next 48 hours, she will snort another three lines of speed, four lines of crystal methamphetamine, swallow six ecstasy tablets and smoke five bongs packed with hydroponic cannabis.
By Sunday afternoon, Kate will have to come down from her chemically induced high. So she will snort a line of ketamine, a horse tranquilliser known on the streets as "Special K", and smoke more cannabis.
Her weekend drug binges, costing more than $400, sound extreme. But Kate insists this is standard among Perth's cashed-up 20-somethings.
"All my friends take just as many drugs," said the 25-year-old accounts manager, who owns her house in Carine.
"We're not addicted, but we get together and it's just what we do on the weekends.
"If my boss or my parents knew what I got up to, they would totally freak.
"But the thing is, everyone's doing it. Taking an E (ecstasy tablet) is as common as having a glass of wine.
"At any Perth club on a Friday or Saturday night, I'd say easily 90 per cent of people are on speed, pills or ice."
On Monday, Kate is back at her $60,000-a-year job at a prominent Perth firm. Her friends – a nurse, a store manager and a primary school teacher – are also at work "coming down" from a chemical cocktail.
Boy given to violent father
By CATHERINE MADDEN
11sep05
A TWO-YEAR-OLD boy has been handed back to his father by the Department for Community Development despite the man's history of extreme domestic violence, drug abuse and criminal offences.
The child's mother, who committed suicide aged 25 after years of horrific physical, mental and emotional abuse by the man, had documented the danger to the child in diaries – which the DCD refused to read.
DCD case conference reports from February 2004 reveal the department knew of the man's record, yet he was awarded full-time care of the child, a state ward, in October.
GAY COUPLE TO ADOPT: Two WA men approved as parents
EXCLUSIVE
By TREVOR PADDENBURG
11sep05
A GAY couple have been approved to adopt a child – a WA first under liberalised laws that came into force in 2002.
The application, by a male couple, has been approved by the Department for Community Development.
The historic laws allow same-sex couples to adopt children if they can convince authorities they would make suitable parents – the same criteria for heterosexual couples.
The gay partners are among 118 WA couples approved to adopt a child, most of whom will wait an average of two years.
But the two men may never become fathers because a child's birth mother also has to approve the foster parents.
Opposition Leader Matt Birney slammed the department's decision, saying it was disappointing, disturbing and against a child's best interests.
He said the debate about same-sex parents had been "hijacked" by a focus on the rights of gay parents rather than the rights of children.
"I can't support it. I find it very disappointing and I think most people out there would find this quite disturbing," he said.
Mr Birney said every child deserved to grow up with the influence of a mother and a father.
"Out in the real world, you don't always have that opportunity, but in this case the Government can provide that opportunity," he said.
"Instead, they are imposing their own political ideology on the system and denying a child the best start in life he or she could have."
Australian Family Association WA branch president John Barich described the liberal laws as obscene, anti-social and against the community's wishes.
But Greens MP Giz Watson, a lesbian whose partner of 16 years has three children, said critics of gay adoption were old-fashioned and ill-informed.
She said it was good news the gay couple had taken advantage of the changed laws because sex and sexuality had no bearing on being a good parent.
"There are many examples of same-sex couples raising children in a healthy, loving and stable home environment," she said.
"The main thing to recognise is that a stable, loving couple provide the best environment for children, and gay couples are just as capable as heterosexual couples of providing that."
Despite adoption approval here, the gay couple cannot adopt a foreign child because no other country accepts applications from same-sex couples.
In WA, relinquishing mothers have to give their tick of approval to potential foster parents.
Department for Community Development acting adoptions manager Bob Sprenkels said it meant the gay couple could be "chosen at any time or may never be chosen".
Ms Watson agreed that relinquishing parents should have the final say on who could adopt their child.
But gay couples should be considered on the same terms as heterosexual couples, she said.
`Snub' earns city the dull tagBy BRADEN QUARTERMAINE
11sep05
CRITICS are infuriated by the State Government's decision to knock back the chance to host the Donald Trump-NBC-owned Miss Universe extravaganza next May.
Describing the decision as embarrassing, they say it confirms Perth's reputation as "Dullsville".
Perth was in the box seat to host the money-spinning tourism bonanza for a $7.7 million hosting fee, as well as providing credit for another $7.7 million in case of a sponsorship shortfall.
But EventsCorp told WA businessman Jonathan Westbrook on Thursday it would not support his proposal to host the event in Perth.
The world-famous pageant has a television audience of 800 million in 170 countries.
At least 80 beauties from around the world would have spent up to four weeks in WA in the lead-up, showcasing our tourism hot spots worldwide.
