HI-TECH equipment is being used to test for drugs in 10 of the county's schools.

The pilot project has been developed by the police with the schools, which have not been identified, and Kent County Council drugs prevention teams and avoids directly testing pupils for drugs.

Instead, police officers use a piece of equipment called Ion Track Tester, alongside sniffer dogs, to swab school equipment such as lockers, desks and the school bus to find out if pupils are bringing drugs into school.

The technology was initially developed in America to test for explosives and it is now used at airports throughout the world. It can distinguish between the different classes of drugs.

Cllr Paul Carter, Kent County Council's cabinet member for education, said the tests were not indicative of a wider drugs problem in schools in the county. However, a report by county councillors recently raised concerns that many of the county's schools did not have a fully-developed drugs policy.

Cllr Carter said: "Clearly the majority of kids in schools do not want drugs in their institution and this is clearly about drug prevention and drug education.

"The headteachers, with their board of governors, have to be sensitive to all of the issues involved and make sure that when they do adopt the Ion tracker system, or involve the passive dogs, that they do it sensibly and responsibly.

"I have every confidence headteachers will adopt it in the most sensible way to get the maximum benefit from it."

Liberty, the civil rights group, said it had concerns about the possible invasion of privacy.