Logan mayor Luke Smith has accused the Turnbull government of having an "atrocious" understanding of his city after it was named as the second and largest site of the Commonwealth's drug-testing trial for welfare recipients.
Social Services Minister Christian Porter and Human Services Minister Alan Tudge will make the announcement in Beenleigh, south of Brisbane, on Wednesday.
But Mr Smith says he only found out about the trial after a call from a media outlet and slammed the government over a lack of consultation.
"I think to announce this from the top down is a disgrace and the lack of consultation is something I am quite amazed by," Mr Smith said.
He agrees accountability is needed for those on welfare payments but he is resistant to Logan taking part in the trial.
"The drug problem is clearly a nationwide issue ... to stigmatise Logan with this is quite an atrocious lack of understanding of what's going on, on the ground," he said.
Mr Tudge told ABC radio that Logan was chosen due to a spike in drug-related problems and the "good" drug and alcohol programs available.
He said a previous trial taking place in Logan, where money was only to be spent on basics using a card with minimal cash available, had helped vulnerable people.
But Mr Smith called this earlier trial a "disaster" and feared the federal government was going to dump another "ideological" trial on Logan.
Opposition frontbencher Jim Chalmers, whose electorate includes Logan, said the trial was more about "knocking Logan" than about getting people off welfare.
"This idea has been tried elsewhere and didn't work. Medical experts like the Australian Medical Association, St Vincent's Health and the Royal Australasian College of Physicians all tell us this is a bad idea," Mr Chalmers said.
Mr Tudge said from 2018 new recipients of the unemployment benefits Newstart and Youth Allowance would be randomly drug-tested.
About 2500 people in Logan are expected to be tested in coming years.
On Tuesday, Canterbury-Bankstown in western Sydney was chosen as the first of three trial sites due to the high number people signing up for welfare and the rapid growth of ice-fuelled hospitalisations in the area.
