DRUGS workers and local people have expressed concern after a bag of needles was discovered outside a primary school.

The unopened bag of unused syringes was found close to St Anne's Primary School, Francis Street, Blackburn.

The school is close to the THOMAS (Those On the Margins of Society) drug rehabilitation project based at St Anne's Church.

Today the head of the project, Father Jim McCartney, said whoever had dropped the needles would have had nothing to do with the rehabilitation work carried out at the facility.

But he could not say whether they had been left by a 'drifter' visiting the centre's separate drop in centre for a meal.

The needles were removed by Blackburn with Darwen Council and destroyed after they were found, on Monday.

A father of two boys attending the school, aged eight and six, who asked not to be named, claimed to witness the needles being discovered. The 25-year-old said: "Father Jim does a great deal and I have a lot of respect for him.

"But these people shouldn't hang around the school.

"There should be places to get rid of the needles rather than in the school playground. It was a traffic warden who found them. There's always parking problems outside the schools and he found them after one of the kids noticed them."

The THOMAS Project only works with people who are completely drug-free, with regular checks made using drug tests. The facility has been widely praised for its work.

Father Jim said: "There is an increasing number of young people who are hanging round this territory during the evening and late at night and we believe that this needs to be addressed.

"Our rehabilitation project only works with people who are drug free and who in fact would be role models to this transient group of people who congregate in this area."

The head teacher of St Anne's School, Steve Nicholson, praised the project for its work. He said: "The caretaker sweeps the grounds regularly every morning. From what I have heard from my staff they weren't there at lunchtime. It was between lunchtime and 3.15pm that they must have been dropped.

"Our children are educated and they all know that if a syringe is found, used or unused, to move away and report it to a teacher. I don't know where they came from. We are in the town centre and there are lots of things we find in the grounds, notably smashed bottles on a Monday morning.

"I have worked closely with Father Jim for eight years and if there are any complaints at all he has reacted on our behalf and has always supported the school."