“The most common responses from festival-goers included concealing their drugs well, avoiding the dogs on arrival, sending ‘spotters’ ahead to report on police activity, avoiding personal risk by getting ‘braver’ friends or partners to carry their drugs, buying drugs inside the event instead of bringing them, switching to drugs they believe are less likely to be detected, and taking drugs before the festival,” Ms Grigg said. NDRI researcher Jodie Grigg, who led the study of 2000 outdoor music festival-goers in Victoria and Western Australia, said that the threat of drug detection dogs instead resulted in a variety of alternative responses to avoid detection, some of which could be potentially harmful. The vast majority – 96 per cent – of people who intended to use illicit drugs were not deterred by the expected presence of drug detection dogs. It found that among those intending to use illicit drugs at the last event they attended, only 4 per cent changed their mind based on the expectation that drug detection dogs would be present. The study is the first to ask festival-goers about their actual behaviour in response to the presence of drug detection dogs at outdoor music festivals in Australia. The use of drug detection dogs as a policing strategy at outdoor music festivals is ineffective as a deterrent to illicit drug use, can lead to unintended harm, and should be urgently reconsidered, according to a new study conducted by the National Drug Research Institute (NDRI) at Curtin University, and published in the International Journal of Drug Policy.
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