NEWS.com.au
Perth Australia-May 21, 2006. The problem has become so common that principals are asking police to use sniffer dogs to check children for cannabis and amphetamines.
The Sunday Times also can reveal that senior WA police are meeting monthly with teachers and principals in Perth and country towns to try to combat the drug scourge.
Supt David Parkinson said parents and politicians would be naive to think drugs were not in public, private and Catholic schools throughout WA.
He said police had made the disturbing discovery that some parents were supplying drugs to their children and ordering them to sell the illicit substances to classmates.
"Some of these low-lifes are using their kids to access the (drug) market in schools," Supt Parkinson said.
"Some principals have asked for the dog squad to be brought in and we are having a look at the legality of that."
The warning came as police charged five students from Waroona District High School in the South-West with drug offences.
A 12-year-old boy and a 13-year-old girl were charged with supplying cannabis. Three other students aged between 13 and 14 were charged with possession of cannabis or a smoking implement.
But Supt Parkinson said the drug problem was not isolated to any school or region.
"It's not just one or two incidents. You'd have to be naive, you'd really have to have your head in the sand, to think drugs are not in the majority of schools," he said.
"Police are meeting with principals across the districts and we're getting our drug and alcohol people in to find out who are the dealers and suppliers."
Supt Parkinson said police had found syringes in bush near several schools, with evidence they had been used by students to inject amphetamines.
"In one case, the kids threw the used syringes in one particular tree they called the Christmas tree," he said.
The latest National Drug Strategy Household Survey showed a third of teenagers had used illicit drugs.
One in four had tried cannabis and one in 15 had tried amphetamines.
Detectives told The Sunday Times drugs were regularly found in Perth schools, though teenagers were often disciplined without police being called in.
John Barich, WA director of Drug Free Australia, blamed schools for going soft on drugs to protect their reputations.
"The schools are all looking the other way because they're too scared of what they might find," Mr Barich said.
But Department of Education and Training acting executive director Chris Cook said children who wanted to use drugs were more likely to do so outside school.
"Schools are a setting that is controlled, supervised and monitored, the opportunity to use drugs in such a setting is limited," Ms Cook said.
WA Catholic Education Office director Ron Dullard said it was rare that students were caught with drugs, but he admitted illicit substances were in schools.
"Drugs are endemic in our society and it does rear its head now and then," Mr Dullard said.
Education Minister Ljiljanna Ravlich earlier this year revealed that children as young as 10 would be shown bongs at school as part of a push to educate them about drugs.
National Drug Research Institute director Steve Allsop said 12-year-olds dealing drugs were a "real concern", but he warned parents not to panic because drug use among the very young was not widespread.
