A shooting gallery for intravenous drug addicts in Vancouver's Downtown Eastside scored another legal victory Friday when British Columbia’s highest court agreed that a federal drug law is unconstitutional.
“We can stay open, it is no longer a federal decision,” said Liz Evans, executive director of the PHS Community Services Society, operator of the Insite supervised injection centre.
By a 2-1 margin, the B.C. Court of Appeal upheld Justice Ian Pitfield’s May 27, 2008 B.C. Supreme Court ruling, which said closing Insite would deny heroin, cocaine and methamphetamine users basic rights of life, liberty and security of person. The 87-page judgment was released Friday morning.
“To argue, as Canada does, that other options or choices are available to minimize such risks ignores the judge’s undisputed findings about the nature of addiction, combined with his findings about the multiple problems facing the addicts who inhabit the (Downtown Eastside,” wrote Justice Anne Rowles. Her majority opinion was supported by Justice Carol Huddart.
Justice Daphne Smith dissented, saying the central issue was the supremacy of federal law.
“The current harm reduction model employed at Insite cannot stand isolated from the sourcing, distribution and sale in Canada of the illicit drugs used in its facility, by willfully ignoring the context in which those drugs arrive in the possession of its clientele,” Smith wrote. “This conflicts with Canada’s constitutional mandate for criminal law.”
The harm-reduction measure operated with a three-year federal exemption from the Controlled Drugs and Substances Act granted Sept. 12, 2003. Health Canada gave extensions at the end of 2007 and in mid-2008. When Ottawa refused to grant a third extension, separate court challenges were filed by PHS Community Services Society and drug addicts Dean Wilson and Shelly Tomic and the Vancouver Area Network of Drug Users.
Insite operates on contract with the provincially-funded Vancouver Coastal Health authority from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. daily for users 16 and over with 12 injection bays monitored by staff. Nurses and paramedics are on-call in case of overdoses. In fall 2007, the facility expanded with an upstairs detox centre called Onsite. About 60% of the drugs users bring to Insite are opioids. The rest are stimulants.
There are more than 12,000 intravenous drug users in Vancouver and more than a million injections have occurred at Insite. Evidence produced in court did not support worries that Insite would increase drug use, drug-related loitering, dealing or crime.
A Health Canada statement said the government respects the court, but is “disappointed” and is reviewing the decision.
“Until this review is complete, it would be inappropriate to speculate on future action on the part of the Government of Canada.”
“For the federal government to even contemplate appealing this decision would be a travesty, it would be a waste of funds,” said Vancouver East member of parliament Libby Davies (NDP). “There are still many more people who need help, we need more facilities, we need more programs.”
