Drugs find

North Lanarkshiretories have blasted a decision to boot out a bid calling on Holyrood to ban primary one testing.

The emergency motion was rejected for debate at a recent meeting of the full council.

The Conservative motion requesting that the council write to education secretary John Swinney to call on the Scottish Government to halt the assessments was refused on the basis that it was not“urgent” enough.

However, thetories claim primary one standardised assessments were rejected for debate despite a motion from the SNP about the unfolding political situation in Catalonia being accepted as“urgent”at a full council meeting in October last year.

Conservative Group leader Meghan Gallacher said:“i cannot hide my disappointment that our group’s emergency motion on primary one testing was rejected because it was not deemed ‘urgent’.

“Education should be the number one priority for every local authority and I simply cannot understand why Labour did not vote with us to suspend standing orders when their colleagues in the Scottish Parliament voted to remove primary one testing from our schools.

“It clearly shows that the only party in North Lanarkshire willing to stand up against primary one testing is the Scottish Conservatives.”

Motherwell South East and Ravenscraig Councillor, Nathanwilson added:“it is quite unbelievable when you consider the political situation in Catalonia was accepted as an urgent piece of business at a previous full council but a recent vote taken in the Scottish Parliament about our children’s education is not considered to be of the same level of importance.”

SNP business manager Allan Stubbs hit back at Conservative councillors.

He said:“this peculiar attack on the SNP is completely misplaced and is another example of thetories’obsession with the SNP in North Lanarkshire.

“Urgent motions are a matter for the provost alone. As part of the administration, thetories should spend their time trying to influence their Labour colleagues rather than attacking the SNP about something that we have no influence over.

“Given the way thetories have been flip-flopping on this, we may find they have changed their position on these assessments once more by the time it comes up for debate.” Police who found indecent images of children on a Motherwell man’s mobile phone stumbled across cocaine worth thousands of pounds when they searched his home.

James Donnelly, 27, of Bellshill Road, admitted being concerned in the supply of the Class A drug when he appeared at Hamilton Sheriff Court.

He also admitted having 115 indecent photographs and videos on his phone.

The court heard police raided Donnelly’s home on October 16 last year after an online child abuse prevention agency reported that indecent images were being accessed from that address.

They arrived at 7.25am. Donnelly was present as was his partner.

Callum Forsyth, prosecuting, said a “systematic”search was carried out.the offending images were found on a mobile phone.there were 86 indecent photographs and 29 videos.

Officers also seized a safe during the search.

Mr Forsyth told the court:“they couldn’t get access to it, but it was taken to Motherwell police station and forced open.

“Inside were several knotted plastic bags containing cocaine.the total value of this is around £7,750.”

Sheriff Alasdair Macfadyen called for background reports and deferred sentence until next month.