Latest / The Morning Edition / Why the era of sniffer dogs at music festivals could be over

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Why the era of sniffer dogs at music festivals could be over · The Morning Edition

0:04
S1: Drugs and music festivals have gone hand in hand for decades.
0:08
S1: But in recent years, since a string of overdoses, authorities
0:12
S1: have employed a multitude of strategies to try to curb
0:15
S1: drug use and avoid tragedy at festivals around Australia. Depending
0:21
S1: where they're held, festival goers have been subjected to various
0:24
S1: degrees of intervention, from having to run the gauntlet of
0:28
S1: sniffer dogs at the entrance to a festival to intrusive
0:31
S1: strip searches. I'm Samantha Cylinder Morris and you're listening to
0:36
S1: Morning Edition from The Age and the Sydney Morning Herald today.
0:41
S1: Culture reporter Kayla Oliver on the 3000 people who sued
0:45
S1: New South Wales Police last year over the legality of
0:49
S1: strip searches, and the announcement by New South Wales Police
0:52
S1: that it will be changing the way it handles drugs
0:55
S1: at big live music events. Welcome, Kayla, back to the podcast.
1:03
S2: Thanks so much for having me, Sam.
1:06
S1: Oh, it is my pleasure. I can't wait to get
1:08
S1: into this because you have written about a really controversial topic.
1:11
S1: But before we get into the details of what is
1:13
S1: changing in terms of how police are cracking down on
1:16
S1: drugs at festivals, can you just tell us a little
1:18
S1: bit about how long sniffer dogs and testing have been
1:22
S1: a feature at the big festivals in Australia? Like when
1:24
S1: did this begin.
1:26
S2: As you say, drugs, music festivals. You know, they've had
1:29
S2: a deeply intertwined history, you know, from the 70s, like
1:32
S2: all the movies that you watch about festivals, I mean, Woodstock,
1:37
S2: the 70s, LSD, weed, you know, following up until now,
1:42
S2: which as someone who is in my 20s, whenever anyone
1:46
S2: talks about going to a festival, the conversation around drugs
1:50
S2: is also there. So yeah, it's a very, very intertwined history.
1:54
S2: And it's something that has been part of politics for
1:57
S2: a long time, not just now. So the Drug and
1:59
S2: Alcohol Foundation in Australia, says pill testing has existed since
2:02
S2: the 1990s as a harm reduction strategy. If you take
2:05
S2: your drugs into a tent in a music festival and
2:08
S2: the likelihood is that it will kill you like a
2:10
S2: lot of people just probably wouldn't take it. And a
2:11
S2: lot of results have shown that people do end up
2:14
S2: forfeiting their drugs when reports are released from pill testing sites.
2:18
S2: The Act was actually the first territory in Australia to
2:21
S2: introduce drug testing in 2022, and will continue to service
2:24
S2: that until June 2027. New South Wales did a one
2:29
S2: year trial which ended in March, and Victoria. There's still
2:32
S2: a trial at music festivals which will be evaluated this year.
2:35
S2: Queensland banned pill testing and other states have not yet
2:38
S2: adopted it, and sniffer dogs like pill testing have kind
2:42
S2: of been features of music festivals for a while. And
2:45
S2: then that's been in New South Wales since at least
2:47
S2: the year 2000 and even more recently. So in April
2:51
S2: last year, New South Wales Health released its final report
2:54
S2: from its landmark 2024 drug Summit, so it was held
2:57
S2: 25 years after the 1999 Drug Summit, which led to
3:01
S2: the opening of the Kings Cross medically supervised injecting rooms
3:05
S2: and sterile syringe programmes. So the summit was an election
3:09
S2: promise from the men's government and included 56 recommendations. So
3:13
S2: fast forward to October last year. The men's government released
3:16
S2: its response that the government accepted 50 of those recommendations,
3:20
S2: acknowledged a further four, but did not support the recommendation
3:24
S2: to stop using drug detection dogs and strip searches for
3:27
S2: suspected drug possession at music festivals. So those two were
3:31
S2: specifically ones that they ditched from the drugs summit. And
3:36
S2: at the time, Police Minister Yasmin Catley said sniffer dogs
3:39
S2: and strip searches at festivals were important investigative tools for
3:42
S2: the police and would stay.
3:44
S1: And that brings us to this moment, because I'm not
3:46
S1: going to lie, your future really surprised me because police
3:49
S1: in New South Wales are changing their enforcement strategy at
3:52
S1: music festivals, from targeting the possession of drugs to the
3:55
S1: supply of drugs. And this news, I think, did come
3:58
S1: as somewhat of a surprise. Right. I've got to say
4:00
S1: one of the top cops in New South Wales said
4:03
S1: something that really took me by surprise.
4:05
S2: Yeah. So you weren't the only one that was surprised
4:07
S2: by it. I, you know, came to work on Monday,
4:11
S2: knew the state of live music inquiry in New South
4:15
S2: Wales was on. And as someone who covers live music
4:18
S2: and nightlife, I was excited to hear about what the
4:22
S2: police had to say because there are a lot of
4:23
S2: topics that do involve the police, including music festivals, but
4:28
S2: sniffer dogs and pill testing was never really something that
4:30
S2: I thought would get an update on that situation in
4:32
S2: the way that we did, and neither was the Greens
4:35
S2: MP Cate Faehrmann, who, when she asked the question, was like, wait, what?
4:40
S2: And then asked a few follow up questions about essentially
4:43
S2: police's presence at the front of music festivals and how
4:46
S2: they were probably deterring festival goers. So the representative for
4:51
S2: New South Wales Police at the inquiry was Paul Dunstan,
4:55
S2: who was there as the acting assistant Commissioner and vibrancy representative.
5:00
S2: So he's there to represent nightlife and all things fun
5:04
S2: about police. He's the vibes police. A bit of an
5:07
S2: oxymoronic sentence, but essentially he just said.
5:11
S3: Yeah, we're a slight change in strategy at the music festivals,
5:15
S3: in the enforcement of, uh, drug possession in particular, we've
5:19
S3: now pivoted to a more drug supply focus. Um, the
5:23
S3: days of young people attending festivals, going through a gauntlet
5:26
S3: of police lined with drug dogs behind us. We still
5:32
S3: have drug dogs. We don't apologize for having drug.
5:34
S2: Pretty crazy thing to just drop at like 10 a.m.
5:37
S2: on a Monday when you know, no one's really logged on,
5:41
S2: except for journalists who have committed to the seven hour
5:43
S2: inquiry to listen to, like head of the bowling clubs
5:46
S2: and head of the cells, and then you're suddenly like, wait, what?
5:50
S1: Yeah, I mean, and that's it. I think, you know,
5:51
S1: because this was a mainstay for so long, you know,
5:53
S1: the police and the drug dogs, you know, at the
5:55
S1: entrance to the festivals to suddenly announce, okay, this is done.
5:59
S1: Obviously it's a big moment. So can you take us
6:01
S1: through what has changed and how is this new strategy
6:04
S1: going to work?
6:06
S2: Yeah, so it's still not super clear. We did get
6:10
S2: a few more answers after he did drop the revelation,
6:14
S2: but essentially festival goers are still going to be targeted.
6:19
S2: So even though the days of police crowding and hoarding
6:25
S2: in front of a festival are over, it does not
6:28
S2: mean that those police are suddenly just like given the
6:30
S2: day off or told to go and patrol traffic. They're
6:34
S2: still going to be there at the festival. They're just
6:36
S2: not going to be at the front. And specifically, what
6:39
S2: this strategy shift and this pivot is targeting now is
6:45
S2: not so much festival goers entering the festival with drugs
6:48
S2: on them. And there still will be cops at the
6:51
S2: front with their dogs. It's just that the bulk of
6:54
S2: it will be towards the what he says the en route,
6:58
S2: the back streets. So people going into the festivals because
7:02
S2: essentially police have identified that people are buying drugs en
7:05
S2: route to the festival and they want to target the
7:08
S2: supply instead of the possession.
7:10
S1: And in terms of what's motivated this change, I wanted
7:13
S1: to ask you if it's got anything to do with
7:16
S1: a landmark class action case that was ruled on last
7:19
S1: year because this was massive. It involved 3000 people who
7:23
S1: sued New South Wales Police because of the way they'd
7:25
S1: been strip searched. And there was a landmark decision because
7:29
S1: one woman, this was the lead plaintiff. She was found
7:31
S1: to have been unlawfully strip searched. And this, it's been
7:35
S1: reported on, has paved the way for the state to
7:37
S1: pay millions of dollars for unlawful strip searches. So can
7:40
S1: you tell us a bit about that?
7:42
S2: Yeah. So the suit's main plaintiff. Her name is Raya Meredith.
7:47
S2: She was awarded $93,000 in damages plus interest after her
7:54
S2: experience of going to splendour in the grass, really popular
7:58
S2: major festival in New South Wales in 2018 when she
8:02
S2: attended as a 27 year old. So when Reya attended
8:06
S2: this festival, there's no way that she could have known
8:08
S2: that she would have been strip searched in the way
8:11
S2: that she did and in a way that a court
8:13
S2: found unlawful.
8:15
S1: And I will just. Sorry, I wouldn't normally want to
8:17
S1: interrupt you. I'm just going to flag this for the
8:18
S1: listeners because it is it's pretty horrible what she went through.
8:21
S1: So please tell us what happened.
8:23
S2: Yeah, it's actually really harrowing. So before she even entered
8:26
S2: the gates of the three day festival, she was subjected
8:29
S2: to an invasive strip search after she was approached by
8:33
S2: an officer with a sniffer dog. She was directed then
8:37
S2: to an area containing makeshift cubicles. Her bag was taken
8:41
S2: and she was told by a female police officer to
8:44
S2: pull down her top. She was then exposing her breasts
8:48
S2: to then take off her shorts, underwear and to remove
8:52
S2: her tampon and bend over. So while she was removing
8:57
S2: her tampon, a male police officer came into the cubicle
9:01
S2: with her bag as she was bent over and he
9:04
S2: didn't knock, and in the end there were no drugs
9:07
S2: found on her.
9:13
S1: After the break.
9:14
S2: We know that this is something that has significant impact
9:17
S2: on young people, and yet we don't really know much
9:19
S2: about it. What is this intelligence based approach? How are
9:22
S2: they monitoring young people taking drugs?
9:39
S1: So a horrific experience, obviously, a moment, I would imagine,
9:42
S1: for the police force to have a rethink about how
9:45
S1: this pursuit of people who are supplying or possessing drugs,
9:49
S1: how it's going about. And so that takes me back
9:51
S1: to Paul Dunstan. He's the assistant police commissioner you spoke
9:54
S1: about before. He is one of New South Wales's top cops.
9:57
S1: So what did he tell you, though, about what police
9:59
S1: are actually proposing to do because it sounds like it's
10:02
S1: just moving this gauntlet of sniffer dogs down the road, right?
10:06
S1: Like from being right out the front of the festival
10:08
S1: to say, being around it, to catch those who are
10:10
S1: supplying it on the way to the festival. So is
10:12
S1: that really going to solve the problem, just moving this
10:15
S1: gauntlet of sniffer dogs?
10:16
S2: Well, that's still a question that we really do want
10:20
S2: to still get to the bottom of. I mean, it's just,
10:23
S2: you know, you're shifting police away. But Dunstan did say
10:26
S2: in the inquiry that police's pivot towards targeting supply and
10:31
S2: staying away from the front gate was a decision made
10:34
S2: to make young revellers feel safer. So he said, we
10:38
S2: want to make it as safe for young people or
10:40
S2: the people that attend these venues, and I think there
10:42
S2: was a suggestion or a thought that coming through the gauntlet,
10:44
S2: a line of police might make young people potentially feel unsafe,
10:48
S2: and we've sort of spread our area to try and
10:50
S2: pick up on those back streets or the isolated areas
10:52
S2: where the supply potentially is taking place. And if we
10:55
S2: really want to examine what this gauntlet and the effects
11:00
S2: that that has on young festival goers has. We don't
11:04
S2: need to look further than an inquest into this very
11:07
S2: topic that occurred in 2019 that was held in New
11:10
S2: South Wales, into the overdose deaths of six young festival goers.
11:15
S2: Because the use of sniffer dogs has long been a
11:18
S2: subject of controversy in line to what you said previously, Sam,
11:22
S2: this is a warning that this is also really uncomfortable
11:25
S2: to hear in that inquiry. A coronial court heard that
11:29
S2: 19 year old Alex Ross King died from a drug
11:32
S2: overdose after opting to double dump two MDMA capsules to
11:36
S2: avoid being caught by police at the music festival. The
11:39
S2: court was shown the jumbled messages containing her tragic cries
11:42
S2: for help, including one at 3:48 p.m. when she sent
11:46
S2: a message to her friend around mid-afternoon on a January day,
11:50
S2: when temperatures soared to 35 degrees at a Parramatta festival,
11:55
S2: the text said bro, can someone please get me under
11:57
S2: the tree please? Someone? The court heard that Ross King
12:02
S2: bumped into an unknown group of people and fell over
12:06
S2: before a medical officer told her, you're going to have
12:08
S2: to go into the tent right now. And the friend
12:11
S2: that she was with said that Ross King was kicking
12:14
S2: and screaming inside the tent, and she had never seen
12:16
S2: her act like that before. And then she was taken
12:19
S2: to Westmead Hospital, where she died at 9:15 p.m.. So
12:23
S2: she took those MDMA capsules because she did not want
12:27
S2: to smuggle them into the festival that was lined with dogs.
12:31
S1: Yeah. And the double dumping. I'm assuming that means, like,
12:34
S1: a double dose of the drugs so that they wouldn't
12:36
S1: be found on her.
12:37
S2: Yeah. So she was probably going to space them out
12:40
S2: when she was in the festival. By double dumping, it
12:43
S2: means that she took them all at once.
12:45
S1: And so, Kayla, does this mean that police have actually
12:48
S1: come to the conclusion that dog drug searches don't work? Like,
12:51
S1: have they changed their approach to drugs in general?
12:55
S2: I'm not entirely sure. There was actually one comment that
12:58
S2: Dunstan made that seemed a tiny bit more lax. He
13:02
S2: was sort of somewhat alluding to the fact that police
13:05
S2: were going to have a bit more of a, um, relaxed,
13:08
S2: I guess, perspective when it came to festival goers with drugs.
13:11
S2: He said that, you know, that they're often given cautions
13:15
S2: or move on or first attendance notices. So he's somewhat
13:19
S2: emphasized the fact that having drugs on you, depending on
13:22
S2: the type and the quantity would not result in like
13:25
S2: a very intense punitive order. Dunston mentioned that there's a
13:31
S2: top down approach at the moment in New South Wales Police,
13:34
S2: which means that they are trying to create a culture
13:38
S2: where police are going less ham, essentially, and they're going
13:42
S2: less strict on revellers and people who go out that
13:46
S2: they're trying to essentially stop this culture of police coming in,
13:50
S2: barging in, ruining nights out by, you know, effectively scaring
13:55
S2: a bunch of young people from enjoying a night out.
13:59
S2: And really, the reason why this is new, because a
14:00
S2: few months ago, in October last year, they literally said,
14:03
S2: we are going to adopt a slash, acknowledge all these
14:07
S2: recommendations except for two drug dogs and strip searches. So
14:10
S2: it's interesting that it's kind of coming back around and
14:13
S2: we can see a why this is occurring, and that's
14:16
S2: through data. So the number of individuals charged with drug
14:19
S2: offenses resulting from a strip search following a drug dog
14:22
S2: indication between 2024 and 2025 has fallen, according to data
14:28
S2: provided to parliament by New South Wales Police. And mind you,
14:32
S2: in 2024, only about 40% of strip searches actually resulted
14:36
S2: in substances being found on the person. And in 2025,
14:39
S2: this figure fell further to about 36% based on that
14:42
S2: same data set. So it's like there's less people being
14:45
S2: charged overall for drug offences, both supply and possession. Also,
14:51
S2: these strip searches are essentially only really getting a little
14:56
S2: bit over a third of people who actually have drugs
14:58
S2: on them.
15:00
S1: And I just wanted to ask you just a bit
15:01
S1: further on, on the way police are viewing this entire,
15:04
S1: you know, very contentious situation because does removing sniffer dogs
15:08
S1: and focusing more on harm prevention, does that mean that
15:11
S1: police are in some way condoning illicit drug use?
15:15
S2: No, they made that very clear in the inquiry. Dunstan
15:19
S2: explicitly says we still have drug dogs, and we don't
15:22
S2: apologize for having drug dogs around the festivals. So there's
15:26
S2: still that culture. They still emphasize that it's still an
15:29
S2: offence to even carry drugs, even though they're not targeting
15:32
S2: you as much. It's still an offence if you get
15:34
S2: done for that. Police aren't telling you that. They're not
15:37
S2: going to not look at you. I just think that
15:39
S2: it's them essentially just trying to target other people. It's
15:43
S2: them saying the supply is not happening at the front.
15:45
S2: It's happening somewhere else. That's what we're going to target.
15:48
S2: And the other little kind of bit of information we
15:51
S2: got was kind of how this new strategy is working.
15:54
S2: So Dunstan said that it's being led with an intelligence
15:58
S2: based approach. Cate Faehrmann asked what this meant. He didn't
16:02
S2: really explain it that much, so don't really know what
16:04
S2: that that means. I don't know what intelligence he's referring
16:06
S2: to and what they're going off of there, but he
16:11
S2: essentially said that they're still targeting festival goers. It's just
16:13
S2: that police operations, the bulk of it, would not be
16:16
S2: at the front of the gate. It's just going to
16:18
S2: be everywhere else.
16:19
S1: And Kayla, I just wanted to wrap up by asking
16:21
S1: for a bit of insight from your own experience. Because
16:23
S1: you're 24, you love going to gigs, you report on
16:26
S1: live music, and I know that even when I'm not
16:28
S1: doing anything wrong, like, say I'm driving or I'm coming
16:31
S1: out of a bar, you know, I sort of jump
16:33
S1: a little bit if I see police. So have you
16:35
S1: seen these dogs? How do other people that you see
16:38
S1: at these festivals, how do they feel about them? And
16:41
S1: are you and others are you feeling safer with police
16:44
S1: around or is it just scary?
16:47
S2: I would probably say that most of my friends are
16:51
S2: not really warm. They don't take warmly to the police
16:55
S2: being in the presence of live gigs and music festivals,
16:59
S2: and I think that it's easy to see that apprehension
17:03
S2: from young people as well. Police are just doing their
17:06
S2: job to keep you safe, but there is a historic
17:09
S2: aggression from police towards people in music festivals and it
17:14
S2: is quite scary as a young person trying to have
17:18
S2: fun and then you see like a group of them
17:21
S2: walking by and, you know, you kind of get that
17:23
S2: second guess of like, am I doing something wrong? I mean,
17:27
S2: in my personal opinion, and the opinion that I often
17:30
S2: hear from my friends is that people are just going
17:34
S2: to do drugs. And for close to 30 years, the
17:38
S2: idea of facilitating a way for people to do drugs
17:41
S2: in a way that is safe and that they are given,
17:45
S2: I guess, a bit of autonomy to do it or
17:47
S2: not has always been popular. And that is quite appealing.
17:52
S2: Like if you are going to a rave and you
17:55
S2: buy drugs before going to that rave every year, there's
17:58
S2: always a conversation about rape deaths. It's hard for me,
18:02
S2: I guess, from my perspective and from people who I
18:05
S2: hang out with to see why we just don't give
18:08
S2: people a better option to do them safely if they're
18:11
S2: just going to do it. To me, that's so logical.
18:13
S2: But the New South Wales Police force we know is
18:16
S2: a conservative body and branch of the government, and the
18:20
S2: fact is that no one in our newsroom actually knew
18:22
S2: that this change had occurred, just dropped it in the inquiry.
18:26
S2: And we know that this is something that has significant
18:29
S2: impact on young people, and yet we don't really know
18:32
S2: much about it. What is this intelligence based approach? You know,
18:35
S2: what are they? How are they monitoring young people taking drugs?
18:39
S2: Where do they know young people are buying it from?
18:41
S2: Why are they targeting back streets? Why are they targeting
18:44
S2: train stations? Parks like this kind of opens up. I
18:46
S2: guess another question of like, how wary should we be
18:49
S2: of night time activities? And what does that somewhat surveillance
18:54
S2: coded language then prompt young people to do in order
18:58
S2: to keep taking those drugs to go to festivals or
19:01
S2: underground unregulated gigs, raves, etc. because that's what we know
19:06
S2: would probably happen.
19:07
S1: And so I'm just curious, you know, for those cops
19:09
S1: who are, of course, wanting this intelligence, this insight from
19:12
S1: the people who are actually going to the gigs, you
19:14
S1: said it'd be great if there was another option, right?
19:16
S1: So that people could if they're going to do this,
19:19
S1: they can do it in a safe way. Like, are
19:20
S1: there any particular ideas that are circulating around, you know,
19:23
S1: people in their 20s who are going to this sort
19:25
S1: of stuff? Like what would those options look like?
19:27
S2: Mhm. I think that protesting is overwhelmingly the most popular one. Also,
19:31
S2: something that came out in the inquiry was that Dunstan
19:36
S2: said the new special entertainment precincts in Sydney, which are
19:41
S2: essentially hubs of nightlife, that are given more lax trading
19:46
S2: environments in order to facilitate nightlife for younger people. That
19:50
S2: criminal activity has not gone up and so young people
19:54
S2: are going out more to these areas. They are engaging
19:58
S2: in nightlife, they are going to gigs. They're not doing
20:01
S2: anything that is anti-social or criminal behaviour to a scale
20:05
S2: that we need to be concerned about. So I just
20:08
S2: think that there needs to be a look at how
20:10
S2: young people take drugs, how they engage with alcohol, and
20:14
S2: then maybe base policies on that, rather than just taking
20:17
S2: a complete punitive action, which is just going to push
20:20
S2: people to the other extreme. Well, thank.
20:25
S1: You so much for your time.
20:27
S2: Thanks again Sam.
20:38
S1: Today's episode was produced by Josh towers. Our executive producer
20:42
S1: is Tammy Mills, and our podcasts are overseen by Lisa
20:46
S1: Muxworthy and Tom McKendrick. If you like our show, follow
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