Cannabis is a plant used in Australia for recreational, medicinal and industrial purposes. Australia has one of the highest cannabis prevalence rates in the world. In 2022–23, 41% of Australians over the age of fourteen years had used cannabis in their lifetime and 11.5% had used cannabis in the last 12 months.
On 24 February 2016, Australia legalised growing of cannabis for medicinal and scientific purposes at the federal level. On 12 November 2017, Food Standards Australia New Zealand (FSANZ) made low-THC hemp food legal for human consumption in Australia. On 25 September 2019, the Australian Capital Territory passed a bill allowing for possession and growth of small amounts of cannabis for personal use as of 31 January 2020, although the laws conflict with federal laws that prohibit recreational use of cannabis and the supply of cannabis and cannabis seeds are not allowed under the changes.
Attitudes towards legalising recreational cannabis in Australia have shifted over the last decade. According to polling by the National Drug Strategy Household Survey (NDSHS) in 2019, more Australians now support legalisation of cannabis than remain opposed. In 2019, the survey reported that 41% of Australians supported the legalisation of cannabis, 37% remained opposed, and 22% were undecided. In the 2022–2023 NDSHS support for the legalisation of cannabis rose to 45%. There have also been some associated changes in public perceptions about other cannabis-related policies. For example, the majority of Australians aged 14 years and over do not support the possession of cannabis being a criminal offence (74% in 2016 compared with 66% in 2010). In 2019 this rose to 78%, before rising again to 80% in 2022–2023.
Cannabis usage is higher among Indigenous Australians (especially Indigenous men) than non-Indigenous Australians, with between 20% and 70% of Indigenous people having used the drug in the past 12 months varying by region. Two common names for cannabis in Aboriginal English and in Indigenous Australian languages are gunja and yarndi.
History
Early history The first record of common hemp seeds brought to Australia was with the First Fleet at the request of Sir Joseph Banks, who marked the cargo "for commerce" in the hope that hemp would be produced commercially in the new colony. For 150 years, early governments in Australia actively supported the growing of hemp with gifts of land and other grants,The Australian Marijuana Grower's Guide. Otter Publications, Redfern NSW (1996) and the consumption of cannabis in Australia in the 19th century was believed to be widespread.Jiggens, J. True Hemp in AustraliaCharlier, P. Hemp in British and Australian Colonial History
Marcus Clarke, author of the great Australian novel For the Term of his Natural Life, experimented with cannabis as an aid to writing. A short story he wrote, Cannabis Indica, was written under the influence of cannabis. Members of Melbourne's bohemian Yorrick Club (of which Clarke was a member) were notorious cannabis users. Until the late 19th century, "Cigares De Joy" (cannabis cigarettes) were widely available; these claimed to "give immediate relief in cases of asthma, cough, bronchitis, hay-fever, influenza [and] shortness of breath".
Like many developed nations, Australia first responded to the issue of cannabis use in the 1920s, acting as a signatory to the 1925 Geneva Convention on Opium and Other Drugs that saw the use of cannabis restricted for medicinal and scientific purposes only. Cannabis was grouped with morphine, cocaine and heroin, despite cannabis' use as a medicine or remedy in Australia at the time.Makkai, T., McAllister, I. (1997) Marijuana in Australia: Patterns and attitudes. Looking Glass Press, Canberra.
This prohibition model was applied with little research into cannabis use in Australia. Most drug-related laws enacted by jurisdictions of Australia during this time were related to opiumMcDonald, D., Moore, R., Norberry, J., Wardlaw, G. and Ballenden, N. (1994). Legislative options for cannabis in Australia, Australian Government Publishing Service, Canberra but, as a result of pressure from the United Kingdom, Australia began implementing local laws consistent with the Geneva Convention.
The Australian Capital Territory was the first jurisdiction to outlaw cannabis in 1926, followed by Victoria (1927), South Australia (1934), New South Wales (1935), Queensland (1937), Western Australia (1950), and Tasmania (1959).
In 1938, the newspaper Smith's Weekly ran a Reefer Madness-style shock campaign, carrying a headline reading, "New Drug that Maddens Victims".Jiggens, J (2008) The Origins of Marijuana Prohibition in Australia, StickyPoint Magazine Issue 08 This campaign introduced the word "marijuana" to Australia. It described marijuana as "an evil sex drug that causes its victims to behave like raving sex maniacs", "the dreaded sex drug marijuana" and "The Biggest Gateway Drug". The campaign was only moderately successful; it failed to instill the generation with false negative effects of the drug and its impact on society, it did not stop an increase in demand and usage.
1960s
The 1960s saw an increase in the use of cannabis, heroin and LSD as part of political and social opposition to the Vietnam War, and this resulted in most Australian states gradually moving to a prohibitionist and criminal-justice orientation.Campbell, A (2001). The Australian Illicit Drug Guide: Every person's guide to illicit drugs – their use, effects and history, treatment options and legal penalties. Black Inc. National Library of Australian Cataloguing. Right-wing Australian politicians like Queensland premier Joh Bjelke-Petersen and NSW premier Robert Askin supported Nixon's war on drugs in America, calling for a crackdown on Australian youth culture. Following the fall of the Whitlam government in 1975, these politicians launched a Nixon-style war on drugs in Australia.Jiggens, J (2005). The Cost of Drug Prohibition in Australia. Paper presented to the Social Change in the 21st Century Conference, Centre for Social Change Research, Queensland University of Technology.
In the late 1960s, organised drug trafficking developed in Sydney with the arrival of US servicemen on leave from the Vietnam War, and the local drug markets expanded to meet their requirements. The 1970s were considered the first "decade of drugs", marked by the public's growing financial capacity to support drug use and an increase in young people affected by unemployment. As a result, the 1970s were also the decade of Royal Commissions and inquiries to deal with the "drug problem".
In 1964, with the discovery of hundreds of acres of wild hemp growing in the Hunter Valley in NSW, authorities responded with a massive eradication campaign. However, the baby-boomers of the 60s responded to the "evil threat" in a very different manner to the previous generation, with groups of surfers and hippies flocking to the Hunter Region in search of the wild weed which was described in reports as "a powerful psychoactive aphrodisiac".Brady, P (200). Emerald buds in the land of Oz Marijuana Magazine These groups became known as the Weed Raiders—legendary characters, bearing tales of plants up to three metres tall.
1970s–1980s
In 1973, tribes of hippies attended the Aquarius Festival in the Northern NSW town of Nimbin. When police tried to arrest revellers who were openly smoking marijuana, the crowd of 6,000 rioted. Nimbin is home to the Hemp Embassy, founded by activist pioneer Michael Balderstone, and the MardiGrass, an annual protest dedicated to cannabis which began in 1993.
According to Jiggens,Jiggens, J (2007) In a Time of Murder – The Murder of Don Mackay, StickyPoint Magazine Issue 02 by 1977 there was talk of decriminalisation of cannabis in New South Wales, following the decriminalisation of cannabis in nine US states. The Joint Committee upon Drugs of the NSW Parliament recommended the removal of jail sentences for personal use of cannabis, and NSW Premier Neville Wran outlined a plan to remove jail sentences for people convicted and for possessing cannabis for personal use. He said that cannabis use was widespread and that "tens of thousands of parents whose sons and daughters smoke marijuana" would not want their children to carry "the stigma of being a jailed, convicted criminal".
The disappearance of local political and community leader Donald Mackay in Griffith, NSW, in July 1977 placed the issue of the nexus between illicit drug production, organised crime and police corruption before the public; this was due to Mackay's revelations about large-scale marijuana growing in the Riverina area. His inquiries led to the largest cannabis seizure in Australian history at Coleambally, south of Griffith, in November 1975. The plantation spread over and was estimated to be capable of producing 60 tonnes of cannabis. The NSW Royal Commission into Drug Trafficking (the Woodward Inquiry) was sparked by Mackay's disappearance, and the story was brought to life as an acclaimed television mini-series Underbelly: A Tale of Two Cities.
In August 1976, NSW Police conducted a predawn raid on the Tuntable Falls Co-operative, located just south of Nimbin; a few weeks later, the Cedar Bay commune, located in far northern Queensland, was raided by Queensland Police. Joh Bjelke-Petersen defended the police action (including the burning of houses on the commune), declaring he was "tough on drugs". His accomplice in the Cedar Bay raid was the young John Howard (then Minister for Business), who later served as Prime Minister from 1996 to 2007. This would develop into an international news story.
In terms of the broader population, cannabis was not widely used in Australia until the 1970s.McLaren, J., Mattick, R. P., Cannabis in Australia: Use, supply, harms, and responses (2006). Monograph series No. 57. Report prepared for Drug Strategy Branch, Australian Government Department of Health and Ageing Drug and Alcohol Research Centre, University of New South Wales Legislation reflected increased usage of cannabis; in 1985, the National Campaign Against Drug Abuse was introduced, which was an assessment of illicit drug use among the general population. Prior to 1985, it was concluded that cannabis use amongst Australians rose from the early 1970s throughout the 1980s.Donnelly, N., Hall, W. (1994) Patterns of cannabis use in Australia, Australian Government Publishing Service, Canberra
Donnelly and Hall report that in a survey conducted in 1973, 22% of Australians aged 20–29 years reported ever using cannabis. This rose to 56% in 1985, and school surveys show a marked increase in cannabis use during the 1970s and 1980s. The rise in the use of cannabis continued into the 1990s with the 1998 household survey recording the highest prevalence of cannabis use, with 39% of those surveyed using cannabis at least once and 18% reporting cannabis use in the past year.Adhikari, P., Summerill, A. (2000) 1998 National Drug Strategy Household Survey: Detailed findings. AIHW cat. no. PHE 27. Canberra, AIHW By 2001, the lifetime rate had fallen to one-third of the population.
The 1978 NSW Joint Parliamentary Committee Upon Drugs supported the decriminalisation of cannabis; under the proposal, personal use of cannabis would no longer be an offence and users would be given bonds and probation. Trafficking in cannabis would carry severe penalties. However, the 1979 Australian Royal Commission of Inquiry into Drugs recommended against decriminalisation, concluding that such a step would contravene the UN Single Convention on Narcotic Drugs and lead to calls for the decriminalisation of other drugs. The recommendation was that the consideration of decriminalisation be delayed for another 10 years.
In 1985, against a backdrop of growing awareness at community and government levels of illicit drug use, the National Campaign Against Drug Abuse (NCADA), was launched.