Recovered drug addict Amy McIntosh says special commission report into ice a positive step to recovery

Amy McIntosh turned her life around after beating an addiction to ice. Picture: Emma Hillier

Wagga woman Amy McIntosh has voiced her support of the recent special commission inquiry into ice after overcoming a near decade-long addiction to the drug.

The findings of the report, released last week, pushed for a more 'compassionate' approach to treatment as opposed to a harsh, punishment-focused stance.

Ms McIntosh said, in her experience, understanding and a lack of judgement was essential to recovery.

"Even since I last came forward and told my story to The Daily Advertiser, the positive support I received from people I knew and even strangers made such a huge difference to my recovery," she said.

"I was scared of judgement even though I have been clean for three years now, but in the end it turned out that people were on my side and willing to support me, so compassion really makes you jump those initial hurdles of getting help."

The threat of jail was less of a deterrent as it was desensitising to criminal activity, according to Ms McIntosh.

"I was with a man for five years in my past and he used to resort to crime a lot, and I even got swept up in it once," she said.

"All putting him or others in jail does is fuel their behaviour, whereas rehab and real support helps them learn skills to deal with their addiction and make better choices."

The NSW government said it will "look into" the 109 recommendations made by the inquiry, but has already ruled out five of them: more injection clinics, pill testing, ceasing the use of drug sniffer dogs, and needle programs in jails.

If I had been given a bit more education on where these substances lead to and what my future would look like on them, I might have thought twice.

Amy McIntosh

One recommendation focuses on a switch from the criminal prosecution of those using the drug to instead targeting the supply and manufacturing of the substance.

"When police used to pick me up for driving under the influence of drugs, I actually used to say to them, 'Why don't you go after the guys selling it to me, they're the ones letting me be like this so why not go after them?'," Ms McIntosh said.

A focus on education in schools was also outlined in the report, which Ms McIntosh said was a good place to start.

"A lot of the time, an addiction starts with peer pressure which was partly the case for me when I started doing drugs at 15," she said.

"If I had been given a bit more education on where these substances lead to and what my future would look like on them, I might have thought twice."

In the report, it stated: "Criminalising use and possession encourages us to stigmatise people who use drugs as the authors of their own misfortune.

"It gives us tacit permission to turn a blind eye to the factors driving most problematic drug use: trauma, childhood abuse, domestic violence, unemployment, homelessness, dispossession, entrenched social disadvantage, mental illness, loneliness, despair and many other marginalising circumstances that attend the human condition."

For Ms McIntosh, mental illness was an underlying factor driving her abuse of drugs.

"I have a mental illness called borderline personality disorder, and now when I look back, I see that I was self medicating with drugs for so many years, but once I was diagnosed, that's when I started to notice a difference by getting actual medication and proper help from professionals," she said.

"That all helped guide me to take the right steps."

More rehabilitation services would also help the ice epidemic across Wagga, according to Ms McIntosh and the inquiry's findings.

"If you look at how big Wagga is and the fact we only really have the Calvary Drug and Alcohol Rehabilitation facility, it just doesn't add up," she said.

"That service only holds about 30 people at a time, and you'd have people coming from other cities, or people forced to go by the courts who didn't even want help taking up beds that someone like myself desperately wanted.

The 1261-page report collated evidence across all aspects of society in the hopes of finding a new approach to attack the growing drug problem across NSW. Ms McIntosh said a solution needed to be found now before it's too late.

"Teens and young adults are doing far worse things when on drugs than we would have done in the past, it seems to be snowballing, so it is better now than never."