Drug busts at Australian festivals have become commonplace this season, with last year’s Stereosonic, Strawberry Fields, Splendour in the Grass and Creamfields all yielding large numbers of drug related offences; and as we find ourselves at the peak of the Australian festival season, it seems a hefty police presence and drug bust was inevitable.
At the Gold Coast’s Summafieldayze festival held this past Saturday, police charged 55 punters, while drug sniffer dogs have helped nab 46 people at the annual music event.
Featuring a lineup formed from the sister festival Summadayze, the Queensland iteration’s standout acts included headliners Chemical Brothers, Example, M.I.A., and Fedde Le Grande to more than 20,000 festival goers, with police finding 59 drug offences among that number.
Local police have praised the Summafieldayze crowd, with Gold Coast District Officer, Superintendent Paul Ziebarth claimed “police were generally very happy with the behaviour of the crowd with only a few minor incidents requiring a police response.”
It follows from comments that Mr Ziebarth made to local press urging punters to prioritise personal safety and responsibility in the lead up to the event. “Last year there were 49 people detected for drug related offences and we intend to intensify our focus of the drug detection dog operation to reduce the consequences of alcohol and drug related violence and harm,” said Mr Ziebarth.
“Police were generally very happy with the behaviour of the crowd with only a few minor incidents…” – Paul Ziebarth, Gold Coast District Officer
Festival organiser Bill Cross was also pleased with the festival results, despite numbers being down some 5,000 from last year’s event. “It looks like we had between 22,000 and 24,000 people through the gates,” he said. “Last year we had 30,000 but the event is normally a lot closer to New Year’s Day so that may have played a part.”
Cross also indicated that an increase in public transport to and from the event, located at Jennings Park at The Spit helped relieve it from some of the problems last year’s event faced, “the event finished at 11pm and by 11.40pm there was nobody on the site, which is an amazing testament to the bus companies and the police,” said Cross.
The positive reports are a far cry from Byron Bay Superintendent Stuart Wilkins after the Splendour bust, who claimed “this culture of drug-taking at music events needs to stop.” Could it be that after only six months, police have resigned themselves to the notion that music festivals will never be drug-free?
The smaller number of drug busts at large scale events has been the trend of late. Meredith’s 12,000 strong crowd were praised by local police as “very well behaved” after just two drug arrests and two more related incidents, while over in Perth, Claremont council labelled punters to electronic music event Stereosonic “the worst ever”, despite a meagre 27 drug seizures compared to the 30,000 strong crowd.
