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Panic in the Politicians' Sidestep

I truly have never seen politicians move so fast as when it was "revealed" that a Victorian welfare mob had been supervising kids while they sniffed fumes from paint and other substances.

Known as chroming, the sniffing is a seriously dangerous pastime that can leave the young ones brain damaged. It can also kill from the very first sniff, so it's not something one would recommend.

However, when the Spring St mob "learnt" that these on-the-coalface welfare workers were watching as kids chromed the red alarm was sounded, ministers ducked and dived quicker than South African batsmen and the centre's $15 million government grant was held to ransom. Effectively it was stop this or you lose funding.

Now, I don't see what the need was for panic bullying. This supervised chroming has been public knowledge for at least a year - I myself heard mention of it in a long discussion on the ABC.

And within the past two years, the centre got a grant for its harm-minimisation policy and even put out a rather large document outlining its policy for distribution to other welfare organisations.

The staff at the centre have a choice - watch as kids chrome and try to wean them off the practice, or let them go on to the streets and do it.

At least in the relative safety of the centre the kids could recover without fear of wandering dazed in front of cars, trams or trains and if they began to choke on their own chroming-induced vomit a staff member would be there to help them.

It should also be remembered that department staff knew of supervised chroming - and yet the minister denies all knowledge.

This means one of two things. That either the minister unofficially knew of the practice, or is so out of touch with the staff and issues that she did not keep on top of things that could cause political fallout. Either way, it seems like she gets paid too much - like her minister's salary.

As someone with an extreme amount of respect for politicians - their dedication to public good, intelligence, good character and honesty - I think the Victorian Government should listen to the experts who want to protect kids and not the feral bayings of the media who will beat the crap out of any story to try to boost circulation/ratings.

Maybe they should also get off their arses and spend time in these centres to see how the staff deal with and try to help troubled youngsters who they seem to regard as being little more than troublesome political footballs.

If there is something that has really got up your nose, let Grumpy Old Coot know at grumpy@webwombat.com