02/05/2014 Look North (North East and Cumbria)

Good evening. He was a "Mr Big" who you are.

Good evening. He was a "Mr Big" who masterminded a multi`million pound

plan to flood the region with drugs. But now, dealer Ben Crombie claims

he's "ashamed" of the damage drug`pushers like him do. Crombie's

written to a judge expressing remorse. But tonight he and his gang

are starting long jail terms. Our news correspondent Peter Harris,

reports. This was described as an industrial

scale conspiracy to flood to Teesside with heroin and cocaine,

and it was headed by a man called Ben Crombie. He's from Manchester.

He lived the lifestyle of a Mr Big. He had a flash house and flash car.

His children were privately educated. All this paid for by

drugs. Today he got 14 years yet he claims to have seen the light since.

When he was arrested and put into prison he said he then realised the

damage that people like himself do to society, because he came across

lots of inmates who themselves had drug problems. That, though, today

cut no ice with drugs charities. Feeding your own habit is one thing

but dealing to feed nothing and just gain money out of other people's

misery is sickening. The way this worked was that there were couriers

bringing drugs across from Manchester to Teesside, over the

M62. It went on for more than a year and it is possible all this was

worth millions of pounds. In all, 22 people were sentenced today and this

is one of the biggest drugs cases our region has seen. Ultimately

those drugs brought over here will go to street level people, and it is

the effects when you walk around the town and see drug addicts and users.

That's the effect this has on the town and by taking such significant

amounts out that we have through the operation, it does have a massive

impact. Two of the biggest sentences today went to two Teesside

criminals, Robert Hickman and Scott McGowan, who got 16 and 15 years

respectively. Just to show you the scale of this operation, we can show

you something of a family tree which Cleveland Police got together just

to show how many people were involved in this conspiracy to flood

Teesside with drugs. Firefighters have held the latest in

their series of strikes, in a long`running dispute over pensions.

And there'll be two more days of strikes over the bank holiday

weekend. The Fire Brigades' Union says Government plans to change

pensions and the retirement age are unfair. But the Government says

firefighters have "one of the most generous pension schemes in the

public sector." Phil Chapman reports from the picket line in Harrogate.

As the pickets continue into tomorrow and Sunday, fire chiefs

still on duty are asking people to take extra care as we head into a

bank holiday weekend. We have normally half the number of fire

engines during the strike period and that is through this weekend. With

it being a bank holiday, we expect a few more people on the road and

people doing leisure activities, barbecues and the like.. We're

hoping people take extra care, knowing we have limited resources.

The Government says under the current deal on the table a

firefighter who earns ?29,000 a year was still be able to retire after a

full career at 60 and get a ?19,000 a year pension. An equivalent

private pension pot would be worth more than ?500,000 but the FBU,

which is also striking over other cuts and plans to raise

firefighters' retirement age from 55 to 60, says the Government has

ignored negotiation deadlines. The Fire Brigades' Union has been left

with no option because they did give the government a deadline of 24

April after 17 weeks of negotiations, and this was the

earliest opportunity we had to take industrial action, and it is with

deep regret we are doing this. Meanwhile, people using businesses

affected by a major fire in Harrogate in March weren't all

sympathetic TO the firefighters' cause. They are an emergency

service, you don't go on strike. This fire went on for five hours,

still smouldered overnight. How bad could it have been? It is appalling.

I do support the men getting what they are asking for, but on the

other hand when there is a fire we need them there, so it's a really

hard call. Everybody wants to make sure their pensions are OK, so,

yeah, they have got to do what they have to do. The FBU is now hoping

even more people will understand what they're trying to achieve this

weekend with even more call`outs, for 12 hours from 2pm tomorrow

afternoon and for five hours from 10am on Sunday.

It's been revealed that 57 people were given jobs as front`line

ambulance staff in the North East ` despite having unknown criminal

convictions. No background checks had been carried out on ambulance

staff for four years. The North East Ambulance Service has been issued

with a formal warning by the health watchdog, The Care Quality

Commission. The Ambulance Service says the convictions were mainly for

minor offences, some dating back many years. Following a risk

assessment, 54 of the staff have been allowed to return to their

front line jobs. The car maker, Nissan, is to drop a

shift on one of its production lines, with the loss of 365 posts.

All those affected are on temporary contracts. In the last two years,

the workforce has grown by 2000. 24`hour operations were introduced

across the site in January, but market conditions mean Line two will

return to two`shift operations from mid`June. Management says it's not a

case of backtracking. We went to three`shifts to meet the

regional launch peak where we fill in dealers and the pipeline up, and

we always intended that the three`shift operation in Line two

would reduce in volume. As it transpires, it is lower than what we

anticipated slightly, and we've always operated at the bottom end of

the three`shift. It has tipped us under into the top end of

two`shifts, so we will move the two`shifts because for business that

is the right thing to do. That's it from me tonight. Have a

great weekend. It's time now to see how the bank holiday weekend

weather's looking. Paul Mooney has all the details. Will it be nice

Paul? weather's looking. Paul Mooney has

all the There were some decent weather for most of us. It won't be

100% driver all of us. Overnight it be dry. That is a recipe for a cold

night, much colder than recently. Even the towns and cities are coming

close to freezing. It is slightly less colder further west with a bit

more cloud. Tomorrow, most places will stay dry. That cloud or thick

and other through the day. The winds will be light and after temperatures

will peak at 13 Celsius. The rest of the weekend. Sunday has patchy rain

at times. Brighter on Monday. Here is the full national forecast.

the rest of the weekend. Now look at the Outlook with Nick Miller.

Neuer-macro don't worry, this is not the repeat. It is live. This is the

forecast you are more likely to see in January than May, but this is a

cold night for the time of year. We have got some cloud coming into the

West, stopping the temperature going down too far. It may produce light

rain later in the night, maybe a rogue shower from patchy cloud in

East Anglia. For most, dry, clear, temperatures are on the way down and

will end up lower than this in the coldest rural spots by morning. -4

in rural Scotland in the coldest moral spots in southern England, so

gardeners take note, frost for some of us are begins. What about the

rest of the weekend? High pressure is here as it begins. You may think,

great, settled weather, it does protect the south and east of the UK

but Atlantique weather fronts coming to the north and west, giving some

rain at times. First, for tomorrow, it is a fine start. Chilly, a lot of

dry weather around from the word go. Quite a bit of sunshine. The first

Atlantique