09/04/2017 North West Tonight

Greater Manchester Police say they dealt with 31 calls relating

to the synthetic drug Spice in just 24 hours yesterday.

Officers in Manchester city centre have launched special patrols

to deal with the issue in the Piccadilly area,

these people are users of Spice, a synthetic drug which used to be

legal, known to cause extreme effects including psychosis

You see a lot of people who get absolutely smashed out

of their trees, throwing up and falling all over the place.

I just have a smoke and just relax, you know, like...

Basically, it's an escape route from the normalcy of life,

This weekend, Greater Manchester Police took 31 calls about people

14 of them had collapsed and needed an ambulance.

On this glorious day here in Piccadilly Gardens,

shoppers are being entertained, but, at the same time,

police are out here and there's quite a presence.

It's because Piccadilly Gardens has been quite a problem area when it

Over this weekend, police have had special extra patrols on here,

and have revealed they've made a number of arrests

Police say their focus is on dealers of Spice,

but they'll continue to tackle all anti-social users of the drug.

Shabnam Younus-Jewell, BBC North West Tonight, Manchester.

Merseyside Police have launched a murder inquiry after the body

of a woman was found in Speke this morning.

Detectives were called out by the Ambulance Service early this

A postmortem examination is taking place to establish how

Firefighters are tacking a blaze at a scrap yard at Altham

in Lancashire where as many as 50 cars are thought to be on fire.

Eight appliances have been there since around 5.30 this evening,

and the operation is expected to continue for some time.

People living nearby are advised to keep windows and doors shut.

Hundreds of people have turned out this weekend to help clean up

The Big Spring Beach Clean has been organised by the group

Surfers Against Sewage, which says it wants to highlight

the vast amounts of plastic and rubbish littering

The Fylde Coast was the venue, as Ian Haslam reports.

This beach at Blackpool has Blue Flag status,

but, when it comes to littering, the tide is still to turn.

So, just a general bag we're just going to open.

You've got your plastics, more plastics, netting...

Throughout summer, you get your tourists coming down with disposable

barbecues and that kind of thing, and they just head off into the sand

dunes and have a nice picnic for the day, in this good weather,

and generally they don't take their litter home with them.

That is the bane of your life, isn't it?

As with other beach cleans across the region,

there's been no shortage of volunteers.

I was surprised by how much rubbish people discard.

Yeah, yeah, bottles and sweet wrappers.

There's plenty of bins along the coast line,

but you know what it's like - families are at the beach

And that, say local action groups, means an ongoing

By reducing all of the plastic and the waste, it's safer for people

to go out in the sea, which is also good for

the marine life and animals, because they are dying

It is killing thousands, hundreds of thousands

Well, the volunteers have been cleaning the beach here now

and this is what they've come back with -

around 40 bags full of waste and litter.

Along with plastic bottles, that will now be recycled.

Loads of litter down there, a big pile.

Organisers say there'll be another Big Beach Clean in the autumn.

In sport, Manchester United eased to a 3-0 victory over Sunderland,

to climb to fifth in the Premier League.

Meanwhile, Romelu Lukaku scored twice as Everton beat Leicester City

4-2 to put them within goal difference of Arsenal in sixth.

And after a video of three-year-old Elijah reeling off the Everton

team list went viral, today he was given the chance

The Blues fan was invited down to Goodison Park,

and gave the current pitch announcer, Graeme White,

Number one... Joel Robles!

Number two... Morgan Schneiderlin!

Number three... Leighton Baines!

He'd just about said that, didn't he?

It's been a beautiful day across the region,

Well, it's been a fine, dry day, but it will be turning noticeably

cooler as we head on into the start of the new week.

We've already started to see that cloud increase from the north-west.

This cold front starts to sink its way down

towards the south-east, introducing more cloud and maybe one

or two showers but many places remaining dry overnight.

A few clear spells and a minimum temperature of around

So, certainly feeling fresher tomorrow, and we've got

a north-westerly breeze as well, which might just feed

And in between there will be plenty of dry and bright spells,

but even in the sunshine it won't feel quite as warm as today,

And we keep with that cool theme as we head on through this week.

A lot of dry weather to be had, but notice Wednesday -

it will be turning a little bit windier.

Good evening. If you can use a smelter describes the weather it

would be owed a barbecue, and why not? Beautiful blue skies with highs

of 25 degrees, yes, there was more cloud further west, and it was thick

enough for some rain in the far north-west of Scotland. You can see

this old snow on the tops of the mountings, and there might be a

fresh dusting on the higher ground through the night and I, thanks to

this weather front which is coming this way steadily south -- through

the night overnight. Sleet and snow showers on the tops of the hills and