KEY POINTS:
The Government strategy on methamphetamine is under attack from P campaigners who believe the approach is not working - so they are investing thousands of dollars in their own community campaigns.
Methwatch, launched in Pukekohe on Monday night, is the latest grass-roots programme to start without Government support.
It is spearheaded by Marie Cotter, a budget adviser who organised a national march against P to Parliament last year.
Methamphetamine has been linked to high profile crimes, including the samurai sword attack on two women by Antonie Dixon and the murder of schoolgirl Coral Burrows by her stepfather Stephen Williams.
Police are "highly focused" on destroying the supply chain, according to national headquarters.
But Ms Cotter and other self-appointed P-busters are critical of the impact the Government effort is having on the methamphetamine problem.
Associate Health Minister Jim Anderton said the Government was not winning the war on methamphetamine, but it was not losing either.
"We're making some progress, incremental gain, doing some good. But it's like rust, it never sleeps."
Mr Anderton said the evidence of the High Court being clogged with P offences proved enforcement of the drug was having an impact.
The last National Drug Survey, carried out in 2001, found that one in 10 New Zealanders aged 18 to 29 had used an amphetamine-type drug in the previous year.
Mr Anderton has called on communities to join the battle against drugs through the Community Action on Youth and Drugs project.
The CAYAD programmes, which cost around $4 million a year to run, are commonly linked to the Government strategy on methamphetamine, yet they have no specific P component, which concerns Ms Cotter and fellow campaigners Elaine Ngamu and Pat Norris.
Mr Norris' son Dean died in 2005 after fleeing police while high on P and drowned in the Waikato River.
Dean had been involved in a burglary, a crime he had turned to to pay for a $5000-a-week habit.
Mr Norris said he had spent more than $100,000 trying to establish a national resource unit specifically targeting methamphetamine use, but Mr Anderton indicated the idea was too ambitious when they met last year.
Mr Norris said he had secured $1.8 million in sponsorship if the Government was able to match the amount and he was shattered by the lack of interest.
"We have put our heart and soul into this to try and do some good and it's really gut-wrenching to think that the powers above wouldn't be there to support us."
Mr Anderton said he recalled Mr Norris' proposal was very ambitious and would have cost around $4 million.
"I had to explain that the cost of the ALAC run campaign against binge drinking only cost a quarter of that per year to run and the cost of alcohol related harm to youth and communities in this country was far greater in comparison to the cost of P-related harm."
Mr Anderton said the Government's community efforts were based on evidence of what works "and there can be divergent views on what that is".
Despite no support from the Government, Mr Norris set up the Methamphetamine Prevention National Education Resource Unit, which has volunteers around the country.
His idea was to first commission research to gain a New Zealand perspective on P use, then develop resources that could be easily accessed by all New Zealanders.
"A lot of people present facts about the drug but there needs to be more about what it does - it completely destroys and kills people. That needs to be shown to our young people so they can make an informed choice, not be told it's just another drug," he said.
Mr Norris is critical of the Government strategy, which he claims does not focus enough attention on methamphetamine.
"It's all bull," he said. "What we say is methamphetamine needs to be treated on its own - not mixed in with alcohol and marijuana and these party drugs.
"Methamphetamine has its own set of rules, its own set of conditions and the effect of methamphetamine is 10 times worse than what the other drugs are."
The ESR this week said the number of P lab scenes being attended by its chemists had levelled out "but there are indications of greater quantities of methamphetamine being imported".
"We've seen no evidence that suggests methamphetamine or 'P' use in New Zealand has peaked," said Dr Keith Bedford, forensic programme manager.
"Methamphetamine has the largest number of samples submitted for analysis of any non-cannabis drug category."
Elaine Ngamu heads a volunteer community meth group - Te Roopu o Ahikaa, translated as The Home Fires - which has worked on the North Shore for six years and gives presentations at the request of the CAYAD programme in West Auckland.
She is unhappy with the Government response to the P "epidemic".
"Forty-six labs last year were busted in the North Shore/Waitakere area, yet we don't have a CAYAD worker on the North Shore because Jim Anderton has said the need is not there.
"I told him the need is not there because you've got gofers and suckers like us doing it for nothing."
The CAYAD project is designed to support community initiatives, and in that sense it is achieving its goals by corralling groups like Te Roopu o Ahikaa into giving presentations - using resources such as posters, videos and pamphlets funded out of their own pockets or small donations from clubs such as the Lions.
Ms Ngamu said a senior Ministry of Health official told an international conference on methamphetamine in Australia last year that New Zealand did not really have a P problem.
She said Chris Laurenson, the ministry's national drug policy team leader, told delegates the issue had been "sensationalised" by the media.
A spokeswoman for Mr Laurenson said he had told the conference P was a "serious problem" in New Zealand and his comments about sensationalism was in the context of talking about the role of media in developing drug policy.
Concerns about a lack of New Zealand-specific research were highlighted in a 2004 report by Auckland University's Injury Prevention Research Centre, commissioned for the Accident Compensation Corporation.
The authors cited an overall "lack of detailed information" about New Zealand methamphetamine users and methamphetamine use.
Two New Zealand studies, both carried out by Massey University's Centre for Social and Health Outcomes Research and Evaluation, were mentioned.
One, reporting on methamphetamine information from the National Drug Survey, "lacks any very specific detail about methamphetamine use and harmful effects.
"The other reports on the perceptions of drug treatment service workers and police, as well as the experiences of ... methamphetamine users, and arrestees."
The second study found that a greater cross section of society was using methamphetamine.
The authors noted that "the term P seems to be a rather generic one in the New Zealand literature and more needs to be known about variations in form".
Ms Cotter said Methwatch was based on programmes in the United States but had been altered to give a New Zealand perspective.
Mr Anderton said he advised Ms Cotter last October to make a formal funding application to the Ministry of Health or the National Drug Policy Discretionary Fund.
"No approach has been made," he said.
Ms Cotter said she wrote to the Ministry of Health contact provided by Mr Anderton in December and had not received a reply.
Methwatch will be run by a taskforce headed by Franklin Mayor Mark Ball and involve the distribution of information pamphlets through schools, sports clubs, churches and various other community groups in the Franklin community - which has no CAYAD programme.
Retailers will be asked to support the programme by displaying stickers and posters in shops highlighting items that are used in the production of P.
Ms Cotter hopes informing people about methamphetamine will engage them in thinking about its impact on their lives.
The information in the pamphlets is similar to that distributed by the Government and various drug agencies - the signs and symptoms of drug use, advice on counselling services and treatment centres.
Pukekohe police Senior Constable Noel Surrey is backing the Methwatch campaign.
"It's about encouraging communities to take ownership of it."
Ms Cotter is $30,000 in debt after launching Methwatch. Mr Norris had to sell his home. Ms Ngamu said she receives small, one-off grants from local clubs but personally funds much of her work.
"Once you have experienced the evils of this drug it makes you get off your arse and do something about it, Mr Norris said.
Mr Anderton said a pamphlet was sent out nationally in 2004, alerting people to the dangers of P and providing helpline numbers.
Further measures were being looked at by the ministerial committee on drug policy, he said.
