Golden Bay’s first-known “P” house demolished
Onekaka’s P House during its demolition last week. Photo: Gerard Hindmarsh.
Residents and passers-by last week witnessed the demolition of Golden Bay’s first-known P house, situated at Onekaka.
Otere Downs’ owners Alan and Shelley Palmer voluntarily instigated the demolition of their farm worker’s cottage beside SH60 after a report they commissioned from an Auckland-based environmental health expert showed the house was contaminated by P (methamphetamine) and would at least need all its interior linings replaced.
The Palmers became suspicious early last year when the daughter of the farm workers living in the house became ill and just wouldn’t get better. The contamination was likely caused by some earlier tenants well known to the police.
Says senior sergeant Arthur Clarence: “We visited that house on several occasions, all related to domestic disturbances reported by neighbours. We suspected involvement with drugs all along, but actually catching them with any precursor materials or actual P was always going to be a lot harder.”
Those tenants moved out of the Bay, but out of sight did not translate to out of mind because of the unseen contamination they left behind. The worst by-product of P manufacture is phosphine gas, which can deeply impregnate wall linings, which then release the gas for years in doses high enough to affect health. Highly corrosive iodine and hydriodic vapours can also be produced in the P manufacturing process. Because methamphetamine “cooks” invariably possess only rudimentary chemistry skills, they are often responsible for the widespread contamination of their surroundings, according to the NZ Police website. Children living in P houses, even years afterwards, are affected more seriously than adults, with symptoms ranging from migraine headaches, respiratory difficulties, streaming eyes, irritation, and in severe cases, even skin burns.
The Palmers did verify that they had commissioned the independent health report but declined to comment further on what for them has been an unfortunate and long-running saga.
“We did get a report done yes, but we didn’t have to demolish that house. We did it because we wanted to build a new one on the site which would better suit our needs,” said Shelley.
TDC’s communication adviser Chris Choat said that TDC had only recently become aware that the house was contaminated.
“Council granted a consent for demolition when it was applied for. No reason was given to us why it was going to be demolished. Our only concern now is that the materials carted away don’t get recycled. Council has been aware of around five P houses in Tasman before. Usually the Police notify us after a seizure with a Category Warning rated from A to D depending on contamination, and then we act on that. In this case the Police weren’t involved, so we didn’t become involved either. Unfortunate as it is, demolition by the landowner was probably the best outcome in this case.”
Onekaka resident Raine Berry, who was also Golden Bay’s DHB drug and alcohol counsellor, believes P is a real worry.
“It gives such a high – the whole dopamine system in the brain gets massively overloaded. Next day can be such a letdown; you just naturally want it again. It’s that addictiveness that makes it a serious social issue.”
Although methamphetamines have been around for decades, NZ Police information states that P exploded onto the New Zealand scene in the late 1990s. In 2001, 41 clandestine drug labs were discovered around New Zealand, most in and around Auckland. Since then the number has climbed steadily over the country. The majority of lab seizures were in 2006, when 211 “clan labs” were discovered. Since then numbers have declined slightly, even if “meth” on the street apparently hasn’t.
Gerard Hindmarsh
