At the invitation of ACT police and with the full approval of this newspaper's management - occupational health and safety be damned because this, after all, was the enlightened time of March, 1972 - Mr Darling was instructed to drink seven "middies" of beer in quick succession.

The reason for the journalist's sanctioned beer drinking on the job was that he was a "guinea pig" for local police in the lead-up to the introduction of a huge and controversial change to road safety laws: the introduction of drink-driving legislation.

However, in order to win public support, police had to prove their curious new breathalyser equipment worked.

And 50 years ago, what better way was there than to get a journalist effectively drunk on the job - and suggest he report on the findings.

After consuming the seven middies as requested, Mr Darling summarily "blew in the bag". This was a process in which a test tube containing a reactive agent was attached to a plastic bag, and the subject asked to blow into and inflate the bag.

If the crystals inside changed to green below a prescribed line on the tube, the subject was then taken to a station and checked again on a device known as "the Draeger" - a US-built contraption which gave a more accurate reading.

Mr Darling, whose barely disguised smile for the camera indicated he was enjoying the task, recorded a blood alcohol reading of 0.095 which, he wrote later, "was 0.015 above the proposed Breathalyser limit".

"If I were convicted for driving in the ACT with such a blood alcohol concentration I could under the proposed legislation be disqualified from driving for three months and fined at least $100," Mr Darling wrote after his experience.

"The police officers explained that although I thought I was sober enough to drive, the beer had retarded my reflexes to such an extent that I might not be able to avoid a serious accident."

However, even after the practical demonstration, the introduction of breath testing faced a rocky road to legal introduction when the concept was mooted half a century ago.

It was deemed such a radical concept - even though Victoria had taken a very hard and early lead on legislation, long before other states - that it took more than two years of discussion, surveys, debate and consultation in the ACT before finally what was initially trialled as a "rule" finally became law.

In what could be described as a very Canberra-consultative approach to the drink-driving debate, ACT motorists were major participants in the decision-making process which began in 1971, firstly with a pilot program and then with multiple surveys.

In the lead-up to the introduction, one police officer and three "civilians" from the Department of the Interior were out on Canberra's roads, stopping motorists, asking them to "blow in the bag" to test the equipment, and at the same time survey them as to how much they usually drank before driving, and what they thought of the proposed new laws.

"Road safety experts throughout Australia believed the survey would be of great assistance to administrators and researchers, especially as there was little definitive information available on the drinking habits of motorists," The Canberra Times reported.

A Parliamentary Joint Committee - this was long before self-government was declared in the ACT in 1988, with the Commonwealth Department of the Interior and the Minister for the Capital Territory basically ruling the jurisdiction up to that point - first recommended so-called "breathalyser laws" in 1969, a year after they were legislated in NSW.

By this time, Victoria had already moved on introducing drink-driving laws. The state had an appalling record for alcohol-related road accidents and introduced the stricter blood alcohol limit of 0.05, while NSW had opted for a more relaxed 0.08.

The ACT opted to follow the NSW example.

Police in the ACT were keen to have the new laws in place as soon as possible but a combination of factors, including faults with the new equipment and a delay in getting the surveys completed, created a six-month delay which stretched even further as legislative amendments - which at the time had to be referred to the Governor-General Sir Paul Hasluck - were proposed.

One of Canberra's biggest clubs, the Workmen's Club, also waded into the discussion, with the club's secretary Mr B. Dade claiming the breath-testing discussion was a "diversion" and "Canberra's roads are designed for accidents".

"You don't have to be drunk to have an accident here," he told The Canberra Times.

By late 1971, the controversial laws were reported to be "not far off" and police had stocked up on 3000 calcium fluoride tubes, each costing $1.59 each, and four "fuelled collection units" valued at $3000 each, in anticipation.

But still the delays lingered on. Only specially trained officers from the Breathalyzer Squad were permitted to conduct the tests.

Loopholes identified in the ACT legislation, which differed from that of NSW, had lawyers eager for test case. In the first 24 hours of operation, seven Canberra motorists were arrested and charged.

Curiously, the surveys continued as the police made their arrests, even though the value of the survey work was criticised as questionable.

Even a year later, the ACT breathalyser laws were facing legal challenges. In September 1973, a meeting of the ACT Advisory Council was told by that because of loopholes in the Motor Traffic Ordinance "it was now almost impossible to gain convictions in court" for refusing to take a breathalyser test or driving with over the prescribed blood-alcohol content.

As police expressed their concern about the grave danger of a spike in alcohol-related road deaths during the Christmas New Year period the same year, the legal loopholes were finally closed.

In December 1982, following on from NSW, Victoria, South Australia and the Northern Territory random breath testing was introduced for the first time to the ACT after an extensive media campaign to win over some vocal public opposition to what was seen as an invasion of their privacy.

Only the ACT and Queensland still retained the 0.08 breath test limit, but this was to change soon after.

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