Culture

A Tearful Jacqui Lambie Appeared On ‘The Project’ Last Night To Talk About Her Son’s Addiction To Ice: “Please Come Home. Please Come Home.”

"I just can't get the help that my son needs. And he needs help."

by Steph Harmon  11 August 2015

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On Monday afternoon, during a Senate debate on a proposed social service welfare amendment bill, Tasmanian Senator Jacqui Lambie stood up to deliver a passionate speech, in which she revealed that her son is suffering from an addiction to ice. “I am a senator of Australia and I have a 21-year-old son that has a problem with ice, and yet even with my title I have no control over my son,” she said. “I am not talking to my son anymore, I’m talking to a drug. And I can tell you, I’m not the only parent out there. There [are] thousands of us.”

Lambie was opposing an amendment that would deny welfare to patients in psychiatric institutions who are charged with a serious offence like rape or murder — even if they have not yet been convicted, have been deemed too unwell to stand trial, or have been deemed not guilty due to mental impairment. Lambie said there was a “massive problem” with ice in Tasmania, and advocated for parents to be given more power to force their children into rehabilitation programs instead. “In this debate I think the government has forgotten that the people affected by this legislation have already been assessed by the courts and deemed to be very ill.”

In an interview with Fairfax radio yesterday, Lambie explained she first learned her son was “dabbling” in ice a few years ago. It became a chronic problem, and just over two months ago — after he stole her TV — she kicked him out.

Last night, in an appearance on The Project, she acknowledged that her decision to speak out now came out of desperation: “I’m actually starting to get desperate. I’m really getting desperate to get my son some help. I’m feeding out of the bottom of the bikkie barrel here … I’m using everything I possibly have left to try and get him to come to me so I can get him some help.”

In a tearful interview, Lambie said that, with the support of her staff, she had found a job for her son in her office, which had got him on the “straight and narrow” for some time. But she says that since he moved out two and a half months ago, the only communication she has with him is when he rings her on someone else’s mobile. “I fear for his safety and I fear for other people’s safety — that’s the problem,” she said. “Ice doesn’t discriminate against anybody, and those people that are on it, they are known to have strength three times more than their normal strength, and that’s an issue, especially if they’re going to go off into the streets. Somebody else is going to get hurt.”

“Their eyes were nearly boggling out of their heads,” she said of the other Senators, who witnessed her speech on Monday. “But I can no longer sit back and not talk about this, because it’s affecting so many mums and dads out there, and we’re bloody pulling our hair out, it’s reducing us to tears. It’s enough. Because I just can’t get the help that my son needs. And he needs help.”

At the end of the interview, Lambie spoke directly to her son in an emotional plea: “Please come home. Please come home. And admit you have a problem, so I can get you the help that you need.”

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Read our feature on the ice problem in rural Victoria.