Stuart Highway for Lord Mayor - Top FM interview

Daryl Manzie: Welcome back and I’d now like to introduce a guest in the studio a gentleman by the name of Stuart Highway who is running for Lord Mayor in the Darwin Mayoral elections how you going Stuart?

Stuart Highway: I’m fine thanks Daryl how are you?

Daryl Manzie: I’m very good now we’ve got an opportunity here for people to get to know who Stuart Highway is and what sort of things your standing for in relation to this mayoral election

Stuart Highway: Well I’m a Darwin activist of some years I’ve been involved in different campaigns more recently the network against prohibition campaign to legalise drugs and I’m offering open, accountable and honest local government

Daryl Manzie: You’ve also your group the network against prohibition is running a number of candidates in the elections?

Stuart Highway: Yes we’ve got some people running for alderman

Daryl Manzie: And in terms of council do you think that the council being sort of mayor of Darwin would that enable any changes to be made regarding the use of cannabis in the city of Darwin?

Stuart Highway: Yeah maybe there’s some room to work for changes, certainly its overdue and I think the law is way out of step with community feeling and you talk to people around Darwin and fewer and fewer people have objections to legalising cannabis and

Daryl Manzie: Do you think there will be much of a vote hook we’ve had marijuana parties and others contest elections over the years and they’ve never seemed to sort of collect many votes?

Stuart Highway: Well I think we’ve got to educate and inform people because often the media doesn’t give the right story, they give a slant on the stories, the issues, which is to uphold the status quo and the status quo, the law as it stands is out of touch

Daryl Manzie: The law’s made by the NT government, the legislative assembly, the council is not actually involved in that process so how do you think you will be able to make changes through council processes?

Stuart Highway: Well we can approach the government and see there’s room for compromise

Daryl Manzie: Do you reckon as mayor you’d have a louder voice in the scheme of things?

Stuart Highway: Yeah, yeah

Daryl Manzie: Can I ask you Stuart, just about, you’ve stood in federal elections, I think in Territory elections, haven’t you?

Stuart Highway: No I haven’t

Daryl Manzie: You haven’t, you haven’t stood at all before

Stuart Highway: no I haven’t this is my first time

Daryl Manzie: You haven’t, you haven’t stood at all before? I thought you’d been a candidate but you have been active in a lot of campaigns haven’t you? What made you actually decide this is the time then to get involved as an establishment figure?

Stuart Highway: Well the time is right for change people are saying this is a bit silly it shouldn’t be like this, the laws are, all these people are going to jail for victimless crimes and are they really crimes? I think we have to educate and inform people, that’s important so that people know what the issues are and make people realise and show people that most of the drug related harm in the community is because of prohibition of those drugs rather than because of the drugs themselves, and that the authorities spend so much time and resources and money trying to stop people ingesting substances which people want to ingest, people enjoy using drugs and ultimately it is their decision and the authorities, the State should not be interfering in people’s private lives, as long as those people are informed

Daryl Manzie: What about the I guess there’s always going to be people who provide prohibitionist ideas in regards to a lot of substances but the community in general seems to support those sorts of views through the way they do vote do you think we will see a definite change here do you really have a feeling in your bones do you that there is going to be change or is this really part of a messaging process, that is ongoing education that your sort of doing?

Stuart Highway: I suppose its both maybe we don’t know until the day who is going to win and I might be the Lord Mayor but as well we wanna educate people and let people know it is hard to deal with the problem of illicit drug use when there’s prohibition, if you bring it out into the open and remove the stigma associated with that particularly I suppose there’s always gonna be people injecting drugs in the community about 3% and I’d want to make it clear that I don’t like injecting drugs, I don’t like that stuff, I’d rather people didn’t do it but the fact is its happening, prohibition does not work, it hasn’t worked, its futile, it’s a waste of resources, the time has come to change, for change, and its not workable, there’s too much drug related harm in the community, too much crime and violence and I think If people can get the drugs they want from a clinic or a chemist or something, then you take away the profit motive

Daryl Manzie: Take away the criminal side?

Stuart Highway: Yeah the criminal side, remove the profit motive and its no big deal anymore and its just, oh well it might even been boring, there’s nothing rebellious about going to the chemist and getting

Daryl Manzie: Just like getting cold syrup, can I just ask you one thing ilana eldridge, she’s standing for the greens as mayor, said that she would drop the salary from the present $80,000 to sixty do you think that would be a wise move for a mayoral candidate, Would you do that? Would you support that?

Stuart Highway: That’s a good idea I think if people genuinely want to be a public figure and do their bit for the community they should think about does someone really need that extra $20,000 or however much because maybe it would be more useful somewhere else Personally I’m used to living on a low income

Daryl Manzie: So that would still be a good thing? Can I just ask you one more thing? No guess its time to go now it’s the news and I’m getting wound up, Stuart can I just say to you good luck and thanks very much for coming in this morning

Stuart Highway: Thanks very much Daryl

Daryl Manzie: Stuart Highway there whose running for Lord Mayor in the next elections.

Newshawk: http://www.napnt.org
Pubdate: 4th May 2004
Source: Top FM 104.1 (Northern Territory)
Presenter: Daryl Manzie