The ACT's Health Minister said Labor chose not to do a big announcement on a policy to decriminalise small amounts of illicit drugs in the last territory election as "you can only do so much during an election campaign".
Rachel Stephen-Smith also said the government did not publicise the policy as a debate on drug harm-minimisation policies was not good for those who use drugs.
Ms Stephen-Smith reportedly told attendees at the national Labor conference last week her party chose to take a drug decriminalisation policy to the 2020 election "quietly" and this enabled the government to work quickly on introducing laws.
The territory's Legislative Assembly passed laws last year to decriminalise the possession of small amounts of drugs including heroin, MDMA and ice. Under the laws, a person caught with drugs in an allowable limit will either be given a $100 fine or be sent to a diversion program. The laws will come into effect in late October.
The bill to decriminalise drugs was introduced by Labor backbencher Michael Pettersson, who first announced his bill only two months after the election. The Australian on Thursday reported Ms Stephen-Smith said this allowed the bill to be passed quicker.
"We took it to the election quietly. But we could point to our platform and say, 'It's in there', so that after the election we were able to work on it quickly," she reportedly told the conference.
"It was done through a private member's bill which means it could be done much more quickly.
"If the government had tried to do it, I tell you it would have taken two years to develop the legislation ... and we would have had to deal with all this risk aversion and complexity."
The Health Minister was asked about the comments on Thursday and said this was already government policy.
"It wasn't something that we went out and had a big media announcement about, partly because it was already existing policy," Ms Stephen-Smith said.
"We didn't do a specific press conference on it because you can only do so much during an election campaign."
Ms Stephen-Smith pointed to a report from a tripartisan committee in August 2020 which recommended the government examine the possibility of a "simple drug offence notice".
But the Labor and Greens power sharing agreement, signed shortly after the election, does not specifically mention a drug decriminalisation policy. Drug reform is mentioned as a priority for the Greens and it said the party was committed to enhancing "drug diversion pathways for law enforcement".
Opposition police spokesman Jeremy Hanson said Ms Stephen-Smith's comments revealed "a deliberate plan to con the people of Canberra".
"She boasts that the plan to decriminalise drugs like heroin and meth was hidden from the electorate in the lead up to the last election and parliamentary processes like committee reports and private members bills were abused to create a false sense of legitimacy and circumvent normal processes," Mr Hanson said.
"Once again this shows this minister and this ACT government cannot be trusted and is deliberately deceiving its own people."
Ms Stephen-Smith defended the process around the bill, saying Mr Pettersson first released a draft of the bill for public consultation, it was then introduced to the Assembly and there was an ACT parliamentary inquiry into the bill which heard from a wide range of stakeholders.
"There was actually a very robust process to get to this point. The point I was really making was, we were transparent about it but we didn't go around shouting it from the rooftops because actually, that's not good for the community of people who use drugs to have a debate about whether or not evidence-based harm reduction and harm minimisation policies should be put in place," she said.
"We know this evidence, we know that this works and we know that it's better for people who use drugs and we know that it's better for the community as well. We just needed to get on and do it."
Mr Pettersson was also behind a bill to legalise cannabis which passed the Assembly last term.
