Children as young as 11 in Cheshire are being trafficked around the country to deal drugs by county lines gangs, councillors have been told.

Members of Halton Council’s Safer Policy and Performance Board received a briefing by Adam Norton of the North West Regional Organised Crime Unit about some of the tactics being used by drug gangs to exploit children and vulnerable adults in the county.

County lines is a term used for an organised drug-dealing network, usually controlled by a person using a single telephone number. Increasingly, they have spread from cities into more rural and remote towns where there is less drug competition.

At the meeting held last night (Tuesday) at the Municipal Building in Widnes, members of the committee were told that children as young as 11 in the county had been trafficked as far as Scotland and Devon to peddle hardcore drugs. Children were also subjected to physical and sexual abuse, while some were forced to mule drugs by smuggling  them up their backsides – a practice known as ‘plugging’ – and that this was sometimes done forcibly by dealers.

Councillors were told Cheshire is the third biggest importer of drugs in the country after Kent and Essex, with Liverpool being the second biggest exporter nationally. The meeting was told that most of the drugs heading into Halton and Cheshire were coming from Merseyside's docks.

Mr Norton said children would be ‘groomed’ by drug gangs with gifts, friendship and the promise well-paid and easy work, but that the reality was very different - with victims being threatened or having the safety or their friends and family threatened.

He told councillors: “With these teenagers, one of the first things they'll do as part of the grooming processes is they disengage from family and become very aggressive in the home."

He said some indications of exploitation were things like excessive amounts of texts or phone calls, adding: "There is a tendency that what responsible parents will see is a blur of colour as they head to the door and that’s’ the most they’ll see of them all day.”

He said that early intervention with young people and helping them recognise and overcome emotional problems was a vital component of helping to break the chain.

He said: “If you look at those behaviours, that's very much what you will associate with a yob or a nuisance youth, it could actually be trauma, and if it's not been properly treated, the chances are that that is going to carry on playing out and those kinds of behaviours.”

The meeting was told adults were also being exploited via a technique known as ‘cuckooing’, where drug gangs effectively take over the property of vulnerable adult and use the premises to store and deal drugs.

He said supporting people in those positions was crucial.

He said: “Making sure that those who are vulnerable through things like neurodiversity or disabilities, and that we have the sort of proper support around them, so that they're not feeling that sense of crushing loneliness because that's a big motivator.”

Anyone who has any concerns over county lines grooming can find more information at FearLess and SafeCall.