FOREST Bank prison has to get on top of its drugs culture and eradicate it, a Bolton MP said.

Dr Brian Iddon spoke out following a prisoner's claims about life inside the jail at Agecroft, Pendlebury, in Friday's Bolton Evening News.

And he said: "The prison management have to work harder."

Dr Iddon, MP for Bolton South-east, said prison bosses told him they had a management problem last year when drug use among inmates rose to 40 per cent.

He wants to see a change in the method of drug testing from the current practice of checking inmates' urine sample. In the past, clean inmates have provided urine samples so drug abusers can escape punishment.

Dr Iddon said: "The prison should use swab tests or hair to detect drug use."

But he added: "I appreciate how difficult it is. When drugs are prevented from entering prison via one channel, the inmates find another way to get it in."

The Bolton Evening News story revealed:

Drug dealers fire packages of heroin over prison walls using crossbows and catapults.

Prisoners pay for their fixes with tobacco or everyday goods, including razor blades and mobile phone credit.

Dozens of inmates use mobile phones, which are banned, to continue running crime empires on the outside and to intimidate witnesses.

The extent of the drugs problem in the jail was revealed by a prisoner who is his 30s and on remand for robbery.

Massive demand for drugs means the equivalent of a £10 bag in Bolton can fetch £70 in Forest Bank, he said.

The jail opened in 2000 and bosses claimed it was a "prison for the 21st century".

Forest Bank is home to 1,040 adult male offenders, some as young as 18, who have been remanded, convicted or sentenced by courts in Greater Manchester.

The number of Bolton men in the prison stands at about 630, with the remainder coming from Wigan and Salford.

UK Detention Services (UKDS), the company which runs the prison, has declined to comment.