The criminal justice system is constantly evolving in response to changing social, economic and political pressures. One that gathered momentum during the 1980s and 1990s was community concern about increasing crime rates, particularly property and violent crime, and the perceived link with illicit drug use and drug dependency, notably heroin. In response, Australia has experienced a proliferation of criminal justice initiatives aimed at addressing the drugs/crime nexus. Over the past seven or eight years, almost every state and territory has implemented a range of so-called drug diversion programs that operate at different points along the criminal justice continuum.

At first glance the costs of these programs are substantial, with the Australian Government allocating supportive funding of $340m over 1999-2000 to 2007-08 (Australia. Department of Health and Ageing 2006: 33). This meant that in 2005-06 alone, Illicit Drug Diversion Initiative (IDDI) funding for a raft of drug diversion programs amounted to almost $17m for NSW, $12.3m for Victoria, $2.7m for Queensland, $4.9m for WA, $3.5m for SA, $0.9m for Tasmania, $1.2m for the Northern Territory, and $1m for the ACT (Australia. Department. of Health and Ageing 2006: 46). This is in addition to the state-based funding provided to drug courts, including initial establishment budgets of $13.5m over two years for the NSW Drug Court, $5.5m over four years for the Western Australian Drug Court and $6.3m over 2.5 years for the Queensland Drug Court (Tasmania Law Reform Institute 2006).

If these initiatives are achieving their objectives, then such costs should be more than offset by the benefits accruing to the community through a reduction in illicit drug use and related offending, improved health and wellbeing for former drug dependent offenders and reduced case loads for the criminal justice system. The key question is 'Are these programs working: are they, in fact, meeting their primary aims?'

This report attempts to provide some insight into these questions by giving an overview of key findings from national and state-based evaluations that have been undertaken of these initiatives. It will summarise the outcome-based results currently available, identify the knowledge gaps that still exist and point to areas where further work is required to provide a more definitive insight into the value of these programs.