Prison drug testing has been revealed as seriously flawed in the Police Oracle. It reports that “drug free” certificates are being issued incorrectly after voluntary urine tests because – unlike hair drug tests - the system only picks up one or two drugs (from a potential nine) and the tests are taken too infrequently. Certificates, from now on, will not be worth the paper they are written on because of disclaimers highlighting the flaw.

Now here’s an interesting scheme in which ex-offenders are helping to rehabilitate prison leavers by literally meeting them at the gates on release and acting as a bridge between them and housing and drugs services. With two of the biggest barriers to rehabilitation being longterm drug and alcohol misuse, the scheme has almost trebled the rate of those going into work or training on release. As part of our corporate sponsorship of the Duke of Edinburgh Award scheme we visit young offenders institutions – most recently Hunterscombe – to see first-hand the importance of alcohol and drug free rehabilitation and how testing can play an important role in this.