Ashley Taylor Dawson is hoping Hollyoaks' county lines storyline will "educate" youngsters about the dangers of drugs.
Ashley Taylor Dawson
The Channel 4 soap is to air an important plot next year about county lines, a term used when gangs exploit kids and vulnerable people to sell drugs for them, and the 37-year-old star is hoping some will watch the plot unfold and it will inspire them to start going "in the right direction".
Ashley - who has played Darren Osborne since 1999 - told BANG Showbiz: "We're coming up to a county lines storyline, which I think is so relevant.
"What they're trying to do is show every generation.
"It's basically to show the whole story as a parent, as a child, as a teenager, from all angles.
"Instead of just, 'I'm a crazy kid and I'm doing this.'
"Sadly, in this day and age the whole county lines thing is very relevant all over the country and will hopefully educate children on what is going on if they have not seen it, or if they are part of it and they can take something from it and maybe go in the right direction."
Ashley - who has kids Buddy, eight, Mason, five, and two-year-old Harley - admits it is impossible to police which direction kids go in terms of others they hang around with at school, and he revealed that will be a focus of the forthcoming storyline.
He added: "As a parent, no matter how well or badly you bring your kids up you can't judge which way they're going to go.
"At the end of the day, they go to school, they have their own time, they hang around with their own people.
"You can't really police that, and, essentially, no matter what you do as a parent they will come up against things in life, and that's what this whole storyline is about."
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