Fresh warning as primary school girls spotted smoking in Darlington

In a video seen by The Northern Echo, three girls, believed to be aged around nine or ten-years-old, can be seen with a cigarette in the back garden of a property close to Darlington town centre.

In the video, one girl, who is wearing a pink shirt, takes a puff on the cigarette before passing it to her friend, who is hidden behind a brick wall.

Another girl can also be seen in the video, but it is unclear if she smokes the cigarette.

The video was filmed by nearby resident, who described the actions of the girls as “shocking”.

“Children at that age should be playing with toys, not cigarettes,” she said.

The resident, who asked to remain anonymous, said nobody lives in the property where the girls were seen smoking outside.

“If I was a parent, I would want to know what my children were up to – parents across Darlington need to know if this is their child.”

Anti-smoking campaign group Fresh North-East said while around 26 per cent of teenagers aged 11-15 have smoked in the North-East, the proportion who are regular smokers is much smaller - around six per cent.

This has fallen in the last decade -with 42 per cent of 11-15 year olds saying they had smoked in 2006, with 10 per cent saying were regularly smoking.

However, despite youth smoking falling, Cancer Research UK estimates that around 207,000 UK children start smoking every year.

A spokesman for Fresh said: “While it is good news to see fewer children smoking than ever before, too many children are still starting.

“The younger people start to smoke, the more likely they are to become heavily addicted and eventually suffer from a smoking related disease."

Fresh is now calling on the introduction of a new law which require businesses to have a licence to sell tobacco, which can be removed if they are caught selling tobacco to children or selling illegal tobacco"

"We have seen concerted action over the last few years to protect children, but that is the next logical step."