Students for Sensible Drug Policy Aotearoa New Zealand End of Year Report – 2025

2025 has been a good year for SSDP. Whilst chapter activities in Dunedin have wound down, our Auckland chapter has really started to gain traction, and we have created a nationwide group for larger scale advocacy purposes enabling anyone across the country to engage with SSDP regardless of whether there is a chapter in their area.

The Auckland chapter started the year off with a stall at the University of Auckland’s clubs expo where we talked to students about reducing harm from their drug use and why we need drug policy reform (see image below).

Throughout the year we produced two written submissions on government legislation in response to the proposed Regulatory Standards Bill which would weaken public health interventions, and the Electoral Amendment Bill which would make it harder for people to vote and remove the right to vote for those in prison. These are both issues which strongly impact drug harm and the rights of people who use drugs (PWUD). These submissions are available on our website.

As well as written submissions on proposed government legislation, we have also written two articles for the website this year. One of these outlines how safe supply of drugs could be an effective solution to drug harm and the rise of organised crime in Aotearoa, whilst the other outlines the new roadside drug testing regime that came into force this week (15/12/2025) and how people who use drugs can try and avoid experiencing legal harm. Both articles are part of larger projects. Our focus on advocating for safe supply is just beginning; we will be hosting a workshop on how PWUD would like to see drugs legalised at Kiwiburn (New Zealand’s regional burn) early next year, and are currently working with a large group of collaborators to run an art exhibit showing what a legal ‘Drugstore’ could look like in the centre of Auckland.

Our work on fighting roadside drug testing is continuing and we are already investigating potential advocacy options to fight against the rights abuses of this regime, particularly for their effect on medical patients.

Early in the year we took advantage of several prominent harm reductionists being in Auckland for a psychedelics conference and hosted them at a free harm reduction training event (blog post here). This event focused on the idea of giving peers the skills to be ‘pillars of safety’ in their respective nightlife communities and taught them skills such as overdose response, basic first aid, bystander intervention, and mental health first aid with a specific focus on people having difficult psychological experiences after ingesting drugs.

In September, we signed onto an open letter calling on the government to reduce the involvement of lobbyists in the alcohol industry after many companies were found to be highly influential on changing alcohol policies in ways that benefitted their profits at the expense of public health.

In October, we hosted the first speaking event for SSDP Auckland, hosting Dr Jai Whelan and Dr Will Evans at the University of Auckland for a talk on psychedelics. We hope that this event will be the start of many such events and now, with the logistics of running such events well figured out, we are developing a full programme of such events to be run in 2026.

In November, the Auckland chapter president and national coordinator, Sam attended the ‘Harm Reduction and Peer Workforce Summit’ over in Perth in behalf of the Harm Reduction Coalition Aotearoa (of which SSDP is a member) and SSDP Aotearoa. This event was run by AIVL – the Australian Injecting and Illicit Drug Users League. AIVL is a fantastic, peer led organisation and it was a great pleasure to attend and to present on why we need to legalise drugs and not just settle for decriminalisation. Many connections were made at this event, and much was learnt that will be invaluable to the work of HRCA and SSDP in the future. A huge thank you to AIVL for getting Sam over there!

 Looking ahead to 2026, we have several projects on the go. As mentioned, we have a number of speaking events planned as well as the organisation of the ‘Drugstore’ exhibit. We will also be launching our student alcohol and other drug use survey at the University of Auckland orientation week to better understand how drugs are used on campus and what measures may be put in place to support and reduce harm to PWUD at the University of Auckland. This project will then be used to identify other initiatives to run throughout 2026.

If you have been considering getting involved with our activities in 2026 or wish to support our work, then please jump on over to the ‘Join Us’ section of the website. SSDPs work runs entirely on volunteers with almost no funds. If you share our vision of an Aotearoa free from drug (and drug policy) harm, then we would appreciate any help that you can offer!

Thank you to all our partner organisations and all our members who have helped this year. You are all essential to this work continuing and it couldn’t be done without you!

Happy holidays, merry Christmas, and a safe New Year to all our members, supporters, and people who use drugs across the country!