Axe Valley Academy students educated on dangers of drugs with hard-hitting guest speaker Paul Hannaford

Axe Valley Academy in Axminster hosted two hard-hitting assemblies for its older students by inspirational speaker Paul Hannaford.

Paul tours the country educating future generations on the dangers of drugs, alcoholism, gangs, knife crime and addiction.

It's been over 14 years since he left behind a life of drugs, gangs, alcoholism, and knife crime and , thanks to the hospital staff and doctors who saved his life many times, he's now able to walk out in front of packed school halls, classrooms and sporting events to share his shocking experiences.

Over the past 10 years, Paul has educated more than 500,000 schoolchildren from multiple year groups, ranging from Year 4 up to sixth form, tailoring the message appropriate to their ages.

His assemblies offer a hard-hitting, real-life insight into the life of addiction, drugs and alcohol as well as involvement in gangs, knife crime and county lines.

These issues are becoming a major problem and are putting lots of young people at risk and harm, but Paul believes that every child's personal wellbeing should be at the top of our priorities as a society.

Paul's straight-talking approach really hit home with the Year 10 and 11 pupils at Axe Valley Academy, with students describing it as "the best talk ever because it was real".

The talk was jointly organised by Axminster PCSO Hayley Widger, county councillor Ian Hall and headteacher Laura Jenkins, in an effort to do all they can to "protect children and their surrounding communities from the evils of county lines, drug abuse and knife crime".

Cllr Hall has now said he will commit funding to make this an annual event and bring Paul back to talk to future students over the next three years.

He commented: "This is partnership working to ensure our young people have the necessary awareness of this real and present danger through hard-hitting education."

Following his talk at Axe Valley, Paul also visited students at The Woodroffe School in neighbouring Lyme Regis.