When I found myself unemployed three years ago at the age of 47, I bounded around the lounge room with giddy joy and immediately fired up a joint and listened to Cypress Hill's Hits from the Bong.
I quickly lost myself in a drug-hazed miasma and spent most days pinching the nappy and milk money from the cookie jar to fund my habit.
![Getting drug tested on the dole is adding insult to injury.](/web/20170513011445im_/http://www.watoday.com.au/content/dam/images/g/w/2/k/f/3/image.related.articleLeadwide.620x349.gw2ixz.png/1494477012104.jpg)
The above hijinks are completely fictional as I loathe Cypress Hill, but if you believe the Turnbull government that's what most of us dole bludgers do.
Federal Treasurer Scott Morrison announced on Tuesday night the government would next year randomly drug test 5000 Australians applying for welfare payments as part of a host of welfare reforms.
Those who fail the drug test for methylamphetamine, marijuana and ecstasy will have their payments quarantined and instead be put on cashless welfare cards.
And hasn't the government's cashless welfare card in Ceduna in South Australia and Western Australia's East Kimberley region been a roaring success?
Services Minister Christian Porter said the drug testing would ensure "taxpayer money was not being used to fund drug addictions for dangerous substances such as ice and that people in these situations are given every assistance to improve their lives".
I have no doubt there are some people on welfare rorting the system are using part, or if not all, of their Centrelink payments to buy drugs.
![Minister Christian Porter believes the new drug testing for those on welfare payments would "ensure taxpayers" money ...](/web/20170513011445im_/http://www.watoday.com.au/content/dam/images/g/w/1/8/g/l/image.related.articleLeadwide.620x349.gw2ixz.png/1494484213195.jpg)
And there is no denying WA is the meth capital of Australia, after a test of our state's raw sewage revealed some of the highest recorded levels of methylamphetamine consumption in the country.
The ice epidemic has become so bad in Australian it was declared a "national menace" by former Prime Minister Tony Abbott.
![WA is the meth capital of Australia.](/web/20170513011445im_/http://www.watoday.com.au/content/dam/images/g/h/n/5/0/2/image.related.articleLeadwide.620x349.gw2ixz.png/1494484213311.jpg)
But not all welfare recipients are sitting on the couch sucking on the glass BBQ or digging their hands into the back of the couch trying to find some stale chips.
When I was on the Newstart Allowance I only pocketed around $500 a fortnight so I could barely afford a cup of coffee let along drugs.
Not all welfare recipients are sitting on the couch sucking on the glass BBQ or digging their hands into the back of the couch trying to find some stale chips.
Thankfully all the drug dealers I knew were unemployed Humanities lecturers who still clung to some outdated notion of egalitarianism, so they had nothing but compassion when I couldn't afford a hit.
"Oh, why didn't you say you had a concession card, the meth today is only $100," my tweed jacket-wearing academic would laugh. "Enjoy the ice comrade."
Maybe we should adopt Senator Jacqui Lambie's idea (Jesus, what have I been smoking) and subject politicians to the same drug tests as dole bludgers.
After all Malcolm Turnbull admitted in 2008 that he had smoked marijuana.
Hey, why stop there? Why not target senior executives who snort the equivalent of a years' Centrelink wage off the backside of a work colleague in just one night.
WA Council of Social Services CEO Louise Giolitto said the new drug testing for welfare recipients was thing more than "more pointless nastiness directed to those on income support."
"The social security system is simply insufficient to meet the basic costs of living, causing entrenched disadvantage in our communities," she said.
"When there is only one job for every ten unemployed people, how does making it harder for them to get by actually help?"
That's the thing, not everyone wants to be on Centrelink payments and I found it humiliating and it slowly erodes your self-esteem.
And the actually process of going into Centrelink and getting on benefits is a giggle fest.
I mean, while waiting the seven hours for your interview you stand around chatting with other perky welfare bums about unicorns, Harry Potter and how we can pool our money together to build a meth lab.
In reality a strange catatonia grips you as you fear the guy standing behind you with an Indian ink tear drop tattoo is going to stick a homemade shiv carved from a toothbrush into your kidney.
And the security guard is usually a 70-something person - who ironically was redeployed by Centrelink - whose training consist of watching the Paul Bart: Mall Cop movie.
When you finally get to see an underpaid customer service operator she slowly creeps her foot to the panic button expecting you to erupt when told the only job available is bending wires at a factory in Bunbury.
The issues of drugs are a complex and exhausting issue. And yes, the government is highly-unlikely to target someone of my vintage.
But in the end, Ms Giolitto best sums what will happen if the Turnbull government goes ahead with drug testing.
"How kicking people off welfare and consigning them to the gutter is supposed to help deal with the complex health issue of substance addiction is beyond me," she said.
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