The figure emerged as nine men appeared before Southampton magistrates facing charges of smuggling cannabis into the UK.

The court heard that the amount of cannabis resin discovered on the vessel Abbira was in excess of five tonnes.

The seizure is thought to be one of the largest of its kind in the UK.

Parents are up in arms this week as an internet paedophile was jailed for just 16 weeks at Southampton Crown Court.

Christopher Key, 25, a road maintenance worker, was found guilty after police received a tip off and confiscated his computer from his home in Whiteley, where indecent images of children as young as six were found hidden deep in the hard drive.

Video footage and numerous stills were found of children in lewd and vulgar situations along with thousands of adult pornography images.

Key admitted nine charges of possessing indecent images of a child for show and 14 counts of possessing indecent images.

Defence lawyer for the case, Jamie Porter described Key as a lonely man and recommended that he attended a sexual offender’s rehabilitation program.  Porter also commented ‘he began dabbling in images which he knew to be of an illegal nature. It gave him the bug. The majority of what he viewed is at the bottom end of the scale and he recognises these children are vulnerable because of this abuse.”

A concerned mother commented on the case, ‘I think that sentences for this type of offence should be longer and harsher, it is something that concerns parents of children of all ages.’

By Tim Wilkes

In the lecture i only learnt a small amount because in year 12 Government and Politics, i had already studied the topics in great depth. It was an interesting refresher for me as i had not thought alot about politics in the past years but is something that interests me. The topic of the constitution, covered in the lecture may not be the area of journalism i wish to enter but i can understand as a key aspect of the profession.