Thursday Mar 16 05:41 AEDT
The government expects to spend $6 million a year to distribute unsniffable Opal fuel in central Australia and every community that wants it will get it, Health Minister Tony Abbott says.
Advocacy group the Opal Alliance has renewed its call for the rollout of unsniffable fuel across three states in central Australia to fight petrol sniffing.
It comes as an Access Economics report, commissioned by the alliance, found petrol sniffing was a $78.9 million strain on Australia's health and justice system.
Mr Abbott said the government had increased its spending on the rollout of Opal fuel and has projected it would spend $6 million a year on it.
"(Sniffing is) horrifying, and the government has dramatically expanded the rollout of Opal fuel over the last 12 months or so," he told ABC TV.
"Twelve months ago we were spending just $1 million a year ..., we are now projecting to spend up to $6 million a year to roll out this unsniffable Opal petrol."
All communities that wanted Opal fuel would get it, he said.
"No community that has requested unsniffable petrol has been denied it and my intention is that every community that wants this petrol gets it," he said.
But he said he would not force it on Aboriginal communities.
"We're not in the business of imposing solutions on what are to some extent at least self governing communities and we've got to remember this that petrol sniffing doesn't happen in isolation," he said.
Mr Abbott said there also needed to be good programs in place to combat alienation in remote places and encourage local leadership to come out against petrol sniffing.
"Obviously this is one of those situations where a bit of community leadership would go a very long way," he said.
