Can residents lawfully keep injecting equipment in their rooms?
Yes. The possession of injecting equipment such as needles, syringes and other paraphernalia is lawful. Organisations who may be working with injectors do not commit an offence by allowing people to possess such equipment on site, even if they know or suspect controlled drugs are being injected on site. Organisations would need to ensure that the presence of such equipment does not represent a hazard. Uncapped equipment and contaminated sharps represent an unacceptable hazard and so would need to be addressed under Health and Safety policy. But clean equipment, and equipment safely disposed of in a Sharps Box would not usually present a health and safety risk. Organisations that intend to work with injectors should develop policy and practice which encourages people to adopt safer practice around injecting such as maintaining suffficient amounts of clean equipment, and safe disposal.
