RANDOM drug testing will come into force at the Alexander Maconochie Centre this week, as the ACT government moves to crack down on substance abuse among detainees.
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Justice and Community Safety said the first group of prisoners would be tested before the end of the month.
The new regime follows a three-month trial, after ACT Corrective Services found the previous method of testing was not providing enough intelligence on drug use at the jail.
JACS said testing would be carried out by AMC staff.
A spokeswoman said new tests were part of a suite of drug prevention measures in the AMC. ''Testing is carried out at random so that detainees do not have any forewarning of the types or times of testing, therefore it would be inappropriate to describe the process in detail,'' she said.
''We can confirm it is intended that random testing be applied across all remand and sentenced areas, for men and women, and including at the [Transitional Release Centre].''
But JACS could not put a dollar figure on the cost of the new regime.
''Testing will be carried out by AMC staff within normal duties, so no additional staff cost is attributed to this process.
''The costs for analysis vary, depending on the type of material tested for and the preliminary results obtained during the testing.''
The previous drug testing system involved testing prisoners in large blocks over short periods of time.
Data on drug testing at the jail shows 691 prisoners submitted to drug tests by urine analysis between December 2010 and November 2011. Of those tests, 454 were conducted on the prisoners' entry to the AMC, 43 as part of rehabilitation programs, and 194 targeted tests based on information provided about a prisoner.
The largest number of tests was conducted in April 2011, when 109 prisoners were tested, followed by 96 in May. The lowest number was in January 2011, when just one prisoner was tested.
