A warning that pill testing could lead to the testers being charged by police are misinformed, a civil libertarian says.

January 7, 2019

A leading Queensland civil libertarian has poured cold water on a warning that pill testing could be a legal liability minefield.

Queensland Police Union president Ian Leavers has entered the pill testing debate saying pill testers could be charged if a person dies from a drug that had been given the OK by a tester.

But Civil Liberties Council vice-president Terry O’Gorman said on Monday that was not the way pill testing operated.

Pill testers don’t give the all clear, he said.

They advise on the make-up of any pill and advise festival goers that it is not a good idea to ingest any, Mr O’Gorman said.

Pill testers who operated at interstate music festivals last year did not give the OK to any pill that was presented for testing, he said.

“There have been instances where festival goers binned pills after testing and this shows that testing has some practical on the ground value,” he said.

Mr Leavers believes that pill testing will lead to more young Australians losing their lives.

“If pills are tested, people will think it is OK to take drugs and clearly it’s not,” he said in a statement.

“No quantity of these drugs is safe to consume and we should not give people a false sense of security.”

Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk wants people educated about the dangers of drugs.

The Palaszczuk government will study results from a 2018 pill testing trial in Canberra and another to be scheduled in 2019 before deciding whether it should be introduced in Queensland, police minister Paul Ryan said.