People hide drugs, drink in roadkill: MP

People are using roadkill to smuggle drugs and alcohol into remote indigenous
communities, the Northern Territory parliament has been told.

Independent MP Allison Anderson on Tuesday said people were pulling the organs out
of animal carcasses and concealing alcohol and cannabis in the cavity before
stitching the opening closed.
Women were able to hide drugs in their "bra and knickers" because male police
officers were unable to search them, Ms Anderson told the fourth Alice Springs
sitting of the NT parliament.
She said nothing was being done to stem the use of cannabis, or ganja, as it is more
commonly known in the territory, and called on the government to take action to
prevent the abuse of all substances.
She said alcohol restrictions had prompted people to turn to other substances.
"Unless the government has a holistic approach to combat substance abuse in its
entirety, nothing is going to help these communities," she told AAP outside the
chamber.
"They will go to any extreme to get the substances into the communities because they
know that if they can't have it, violent behaviours kick in."
The Country Liberal Party this week intends to move a motion in parliament to extend
the hours when takeaway alcohol can be sold. Ms Anderson said she would seek a
briefing from the party before deciding whether she will support it.
Independent MP Gerry Wood, who kept Labor in power earlier this year when he backed
it in a no-confidence motion, told AAP he would not support the opposition's
proposal because it sent the wrong message.
NT Minister for Alcohol Policy Kon Vatskalis said the government was strongly
opposed to the plan.
"We were the first government to build a dam to stem the flow of the rivers of grog,
and now the opposition wants to open the floodgates," he told parliament.
Mr Vatskalis said the number of serious assaults and alcohol-related injuries
treated at Alice Springs Hospital had fallen 21 per cent since liquor supply
restrictions were put in place in 2006.
"More than 50,000 fewer cans of full-strength beer are being drunk in Alice Springs
each week," Mr Vatskalis said in a statement.
Opposition Leader Terry Mills said the government selectively chose statistics to
support its position.
The federal government on Monday issued a report that showed alcohol bans introduced
under the intervention into remote indigenous communities had led to "drinking
paddocks" on the outskirts of towns.
The report showed alcohol restrictions had resulted in "grog running" and more
drink-driving accidents.
The NT government on Tuesday launched a new road safety campaign targeting
drink-driving across all of the NT.
Between January and August 190 people in Alice Springs and 64 in Darwin were jailed
for alcohol-related driving offences.