DRUG TESTS IN HIGH SCHOOLS OPPOSED

DRUG experts have been secretly investigating whether high school
students should be subjected to mandatory urine or saliva tests.

Research findings to be released today by the Australian National
Council on Drugs controversially downplay the drug issue in schools.

The Daily Telegraph has learned the council's report, which is set to
reignite debate on student drug use, claims school testing would be
too expensive and would fail to deter offenders.

Specialist researchers, who have spent more than a year gathering
evidence on the merits of school drug testing, have found the use of
illicit substances by students has been declining for a decade. They
say current levels of regular drug use are so low as to make detection
a "technically challenging task".

But the researchers' report shows about 4 per cent of secondary
students are regular cannabis users - equating to around 20,000 school
pupils in NSW.

About 1 per cent - around 5000 students - are known to use harder
drugs than marijuana.

Executive director of the National Council on Drugs Gino Vumbaca said
yesterday alcohol had emerged as a more pressing problem.

"There has been a focus on illegal drugs (in schools) and that has had
an impact...but we are going backwards in alcohol," he said.

"Punitive, intrusive systems (such as drug testing) won't get
results."The bottom line for most parents is that the estimated cost
(of testing) is in the billions of dollars if we are to do it properly.

"We are not saying there is no problem (with drugs in school), just
that there are better ways to approach it than testing," he said.

Last year in the wake of the arrest of former West Coast Eagles star
Ben Cousins, the then Prime Minister John Howard claimed there had
been a softening of resolve to fight drugs.

Calling for an "uncompromising social condemnation of drugs", Mr
Howard said:

"All drugs are evil. They are bad."

In her report principal author Professor Ann Roche examined a number
of approaches for drug detection and screening including biometric
testing using urine or saliva, sniffer dogs and self-reporting.

Among the key findings was that tests were not reliable enough and the
cost would "represent a substantial impost on any education system's
budget".

More than 70 per cent of respondents to the survey said students with
drug problems would be stigmatised as a result.

It was also feared students would truant to avoid testing and may move
to other less detectable, but potentially more harmful, substances.

Serious incident reports obtained by the Telegraph under Freedom of
Information show police have investigated cocaine and narcotics
dealing in playgrounds - with at least one suspected case of ice possession.

Figures compiled by the NSW Bureau of Crime Statistics and Research
show 766 children aged 10 to 17 were recorded as persons of interest
in drug crime during school hours at both public and private schools
in the three years to 2007.