Shameless mother and daughter admit blowing £30,000 of their benefits on teenager's £30-a-day cannabis habit

Bethany Burnett was just 16 when she became hooked on class B drug

Addiction funded by Jobseeker's Allowance and mother's child benefits



Was taken to hospital last week and is now taking medictation to help

She has now spoken out to warn youngsters of dangers of cannabis



Benefits: Bethany Burnett (left), 19, and her mother Marie, 35, have blown £30,000 on cannabis

A mother and daughter have admitted they blew £30,000 in benefits on the teenager’s cannabis habit.

Unemployed Bethany Burnett became addicted to cannabis at 16 and used her own Jobseeker’s Allowance and her mother’s child benefit to pay for it.

Astonishingly the teenager blames her drug use on the UK’s generous benefits system, saying that if she hadn’t been given so much money she would not have developed her £30-a-day habit.

Miss Burnett admitted she would smoke at least 10 joints every day and up to seven bongs, in which the drug is inhaled through a pipe.

Her weight plummeted from 13 stone to just eight stone in a few months as she substituted cannabis with food.

Just two weeks ago, the 19-year-old was taken to A&E by ambulance when she suffered a fit after smoking the drug through a bong.

Claiming it was a ‘turning point’, she has been referred to a psychiatrist and is taking a concoction of medication to help beat her addiction.

Miss Burnett, of Grangetown, Middlesbrough, claims she is now too ill to work – and has consequently seen her benefits double.

But she says she wants to warn others about the dangers of cannabis.

‘I was desperate for cash to buy drugs. I’d use my Jobseeker’s Allowance to buy cannabis every week,’ she said.

‘I would have done anything to get my hands on cannabis. I just couldn’t be bothered to work or study and just wanted to get stoned.’

Blaming the generosity of the welfare system for the extent of her addiction, Miss Burnett said: ‘It’s shocking how much they give you. If they didn’t give me so much money, I wouldn’t have been able to spend it on drugs. It’s their fault my addiction got so bad.’

She began taking cannabis three years ago when she fell in with a ‘bad crowd’ at school and smoked the drug to fit in. But unlike her peers, her addiction spiralled out of control.

She funded her habit with the £57.35 a week she received in Jobseeker’s Allowance.

High cost: Bethany was spending £30 a day on the habit, funded by the £57.35 a week she received in JSA. And her mother would dip into her £115 child benefits, £34 child tax credits and £40 a week housing benefits

She also asked for up to £70 a week from her unemployed mother Marie, who was receiving £115 a week in child benefit, £34 in child tax credits and £40 in housing benefit.

Addiction: Two weeks ago Bethany was taken to hospital in Middlesborough after smoking cannabis

Miss Burnett, who moved out of her family home when she was 17, estimated that she had spent £30,000 of the benefits paid to her and her mother on cannabis over the past three years.

Her 35-year-old mother said she initially thought the money was to pay her daughter’s electricity bills, but later discovered it was to partially fund her habit.

The mother said: ‘I was really strapped for cash and Bethany kept asking me for money to buy food or to pay her house bills.

‘I knew she was smoking weed but at first I didn’t twig that she was using my benefits to buy it.

‘I tried to put my foot down and stop giving her cash handouts but if I didn’t give her the cash she would go crazy.’

Miss Burnett said she was now taking diazepam to control her anxiety as well as anti-depressants and a drug to control her heart rate.

Miss Burnett has been placed on Employment and Support Allowance rather than Jobseeker’s Allowance because she says she is unable to work.

She now receives £250 every fortnight, instead of £57 a week.