'It's the cannabis or me'

Sir Paul McCartney had to fulfil one important condition before Heather Mills agreed to marry him, she revealed yesterday.

He had to agree to stop smoking cannabis.

Heather Mills McCartney - as she now calls herself - said her husband would use the drug as regularly as others drink cups of tea.

'Him and (his first wife) Linda smoked it every day for the whole of their lives together,' she said of a relationship that lasted more than 30 years. 'But I would not get married to him if he was taking drugs. I hate it.

'I could not have him lying to our child (they have a twoyearold daughter, Beatrice) about not taking drugs and then going out for a sneaky puff.'

Despite having slept on the streets as a teenager and then spent several years working as a model - both worlds where drug abuse is rife - 37-year- old Heather said she had never been tempted to experiment herself.

'I've never taken drugs in my life,' she said.

'One time at Ascot two models ran into the toilets and sniffed some cocaine off the cistern and I was, like, totally shocked.

'I never drank either until I met Paul. I was drunk (recently) on two glasses of wine at a Christmas party. I'm a very cheap date.'

Her abstinence is in marked contrast to the early years of her 63-year-old husband, whom she married in 2002.

As a Beatle, he was a the forefront of the Sixties psychedelic revolution. And in an interview two years ago, he said that drugs had 'informed' much of the band's music including songs such as Got to Get You Into My Life (which was about pot) and Day Tripper (about LSD).

He also admitted that he had tried both heroin and cocaine when the Beatles were in their prime.

In 1980, McCartney was arrested at Tokyo airport after customs officials discovered half a pound of marijuana in his luggage. He spent ten days in a Japanese prison cell before being released and deported.

Despite his habit, it appears Sir Paul had little difficulty giving up smoking dope following his fiancee's ultimatum. 'He says he had a good incentive,' she said when asked if he had found it hard to stop.