A 13-year-old Bradford boy appeared before Bradford magistrates yesterday accused of possessing an estimated

£4 million worth of heroin with intent to supply, as reported in the T&A, left.

Lyn Barton talks to drugs project organisers who reveal a growing trend.

Teenagers are experimenting with drugs at a younger age than ever before and they are dabbling with harder drugs.

That is the worrying picture painted by Bradford drugs counsellors who say they have seen a dramatic shift in the drugs underworld in the last decade.

"Ten years ago it was a very different pattern of drug use," said Debbie Allen, service manager for The Bridge, the organisation that works with drugs users and their families.

"Then, heroin was not the first drug that was used.

"You might expect people of 15 to 18 to be using a bit of speed or solvents, but certainly not heroin."

The average age of the young people The Bridge helps has fallen. Today the organisation is seeing young people who are just into their teens and have experimented with drugs for the first time.

"We are finding that some children are using drugs as young as 13 or 14, whereas a few years ago it would have been 15 to 18," she added.

Earlier this year the T&A reported how children as young as five were to be taught the dangers of drugs in a new measure to tackle the menace.

Teachers were to be trained as drug co-ordinators as figures revealed a small number of children could become heroin users by the age of ten.

And Ms Allen confirms that young people are getting involved with heroin at a younger age.

One reason is because there is a smokeable form of the drug on the streets, so self-injecting which would have put some people off, is not necessary.

And she said young people are also being introduced to it by an older sibling who is already using drugs.

A decade ago, heroin dealers simply would not have approached children, said Ms Allen, but the simple fact of market forces and maintaining a customer base has changed all that.

Although it is still rare, more young people are becoming involved with dealers, usually as a 'mule' to carry drugs. Occasionally, young people are moving on to dealing themselves.

"Certainly children are getting used more as runners to deliver drugs. They aren't suspicious and they can run fast.

"There might be the odd enterprising young person who may decide to deal a bit, but it is highly unusual."

Detective Chief Inspector Philip Sedgwick, from the Toller Lane police division in Bradford, says it is important not to blow the situation out of proportion.

Drug use among young people, he believes, is mainly confined to substances like cannabis or amphetamines, rather than addictive heroin.

"Heroin is not a young person's drug - for one thing it is too expensive," he said.

Mr Sedgwick believes teenagers who become caught up in the drugs trade are by and large runners.

If they turn to dealing, a young person is more likely to get involved in supplying amphetamines or cannabis.

He said it was highly unusual for a teenager to deal in heroin.

"We are not saying that it doesn't happen, but we do not come across it very often."

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