The passage of legislation in the Senate on Wednesday allowing drug testing of prisoners deserves support.

At worst,, it will reveal whether drugs are being used in the prisons and will provide a benchmark for improvements. At best, it will show that the prison authorities are successfully stopping drugs from being brought into the prisons and being used.

But it would be fair to test the testers as well. It has long been feared that some officers are themselves either using drugs or bringing them into the prisons. Drug testing, while it would not actually prevent them bringing drugs in, would ensure that the officers are as clean as the inmates themselves should be.