The Victorian Government has said it will not cooperate with the Federal Government's proposed plan to test welfare recipients for illicit drugs.

Key points: Federal Government trial to drug test up to 5,000 welfare recipients

Federal Government trial to drug test up to 5,000 welfare recipients People testing positive would be forced onto a cashless welfare card

People testing positive would be forced onto a cashless welfare card Victorian Government says it won't take part in the trial

Victorian Government says it won't take part in the trial Describes the plan as "cheap, populist nonsense"

"It simply won't work, and it's cheap, populist nonsense designed to create a smokescreen as to what really drives disadvantage," Victoria's Mental Health Minister Martin Foley told 7.30.

"We've made it clear to the Federal Government, at two ministerial councils, that we're not interested in being part of this scam because all it will do is create even more demand for services that are already stretched, that are already under pressure from Commonwealth cuts, and we won't have a bar of it."

Under the trial, which is due to start early next year, the Federal Government will test 5,000 people on Youth Allowance and Newstart for marijuana, ecstasy and ice.

Anyone who returns a positive result will be forced onto the cashless welfare card, which will quarantine their income for essential items like rent and food.

Testing positive for a second time could mean the person will be referred for treatment.

But the Victorian Government argues the Federal Government's policy will be counterproductive.

"If the Commonwealth wants to go out and demonise people and pretend they're doing good work in this space, let them do it somewhere else," Mr Foley said.

"Because all it will do in Melbourne and Victoria is drive more people into disadvantage."

Politicians take voluntary drug test

(L-R) Andrew Laming, Luke Howarth and Ben Morton undertake a voluntary drug test at Parliament House. ( ABC News: Julia Holman )

Federal Liberal MP Andrew Laming has been pushing for years to drug test welfare recipients.

He and some of his colleagues think the trial will go some way to addressing what they acknowledge is a complex social issue.

"No one is saying it's a magic wand, are they?" he told 7.30.

"But what we're saying is that if you know there's going to be a test in the coming days, we would expect that people would change their behaviour, like they have in the workplace."

Mr Laming today organised for representatives from the Workplace Drug Testing Association of Australia to come to Parliament House and test any MP who was game.

Luke Howarth and Ben Morton were two Government MPs who were happy to take part.

"I think this is the positive difference that many people need, to give them that intervention," Mr Morton said.

Mr Howarth added: "We want to help everyone be the best they can be."

Mr Howarth, Mr Morton and Dr Laming all tested negative for drugs, but Tasmanian senator Jacqui Lambie was unimpressed by what she called a "circus".

"Andrew Laming is doing a stunt," she said.

"He's already organised this so he's had time to clean himself up, even if he was taking drugs."

Senator Jacqui Lambie says politicians should be subject to random drugs tests as well. ( ABC News )

Senator Lambie does not oppose drug testing welfare recipients, but she wants the trial extended to cover all public servants, including politicians.

"Politicians and public servants don't take drugs? Rubbish! I don't believe that," she said.

She believes the drugs tests must be mandatory.

"It should be random drug testing, so when I walk in here (Parliament House) and they say, 'You are going to lick the stick', then that's exactly what I'm going to be doing, and everyone else behind me on that random list," she said.

Workplace Drug Testing Association of Australia chair Andrew Leibie thinks it is likely there will be some politicians who will test positive if there is random testing.

"I have no idea what the positive rate would be in Parliament, but the answer is that we would find some people would test positive if we had a large enough sample because that's been our position in any workplace," he said.

Trial has many problems

A drug test used by police to detect impaired drivers. ( Supplied: ACT Policing )

The clinical director of Drug and Alcohol Service at Sydney's St Vincent Hospital, Dr Nadine Ezard, thinks the plan could be counterproductive.

"What it can do is actually make people's social circumstances even more precarious and perhaps tip people into even more dangerous ways of living," she told 7.30.

She has written to Social Services Minister Christian Porter, urging him to reconsider the proposal.

"I think this approach has many problems," she said.

"From the technical to the operational to the economic.

"It probably needs to be reworked, if the aim is to improve the health of the Australian population."

Legislation for the trial is set to enter Parliament shortly, and Dr Laming believes it could help people into work.

"Ultimately what we want is a job-ready unemployed group, not one that's unable to work because of drug addiction," he said.

"The simple element of a test gives us the information we never had, and doing a trial tells us about this technology and how it works in the real world."