Dr. Trevor Bradley

It's a great opt-in, particularly in the lead-up to the election later in the year.

And you can understand, given National's general position on gangs, that this is just kind of a natural extension of that punitive get-tough approach.

But I think it's extremely short-sighted.

We do have a very big problem with meth in this country and we know that there's a strong association with gangs and meth consumption and meth distribution.

If we want to reduce that consumption in particular, then we have to work with those people who are actually problematic consumers of it.

And we therefore have to work with the gangs and their gang membership and the associates and the families and find out.

And, you know, not to do so would be to turn down a really important opportunity to make a positive impact.

It showed pretty good potential and I was quite disappointed that that funding was withdrawn.

It did show signs of success.

It did have pretty good compliance conditions and there was pretty strong oversight.

So, yeah, I was disappointed with that withdrawal.

I mean, I think the bottom line is that if we want to reach those, you know, hard to reach communities, and of course, gang communities are a very good example of that, then we have to work with them.

And it makes a whole lot of sense.

And I've heard Jared Gilbert talk about this in the past.

It makes a lot of sense to work with those people who are part of those communities and

We have to build up a relationship with those communities.

Otherwise, they remain very difficult to reach and they remain out of view.

And the problems just go underground and we don't get the access that we require.

So it just makes a whole lot of sense that we work with those people from scratch.

those communities themselves.