Drug Interventions Programme
Drug testing
Drug testing of offenders charged with a range of specific ‘trigger’ offences was introduced in April 2003, in the police Basic Command Units (BCUs) with high levels of acquisitive crime.
Testing on Arrest is a provision of the Drugs Act 2005 and as of April 2009 it now operates in all Drug Interventions Programme (DIP) intensive areas in England and Wales. It provides an opportunity to screen up to three times as many people at some stage of their detention. A total of 174 police custody suites can now conduct drug testing on arrest or on charge.
Drug testing is a way of identifying drug-misusing offenders at an early stage in the criminal justice process. Trigger offences that prompt a test are generally acquisitive crimes linked through research to drug-related offending and the test - involving a non-intimate sample via a swab under the tongue - provides a swift and highly accurate assessment of the presence of specified Class A drugs (heroin and crack/cocaine). The test is completed and the results known in minutes. Drug testing is carried out in police custody suites by fully trained police staff.
Offenders arrested for non-trigger offences can also be tested if a police officer of inspector rank or above authorises the test (on the basis of having reasonable grounds to suspect that the person’s misuse of a specified class drug caused or contributed to the offence) . Some 19,000 tests are conducted each year using this authority.
The police conduct around 240,000 DIP drug tests are conducted every year and around one third of tests are positive, showing that the right people are being targeted.
