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Paul McCartney gives up dagga

Los Angeles - Sir Paul McCartney has stopped smoking dagga.

The Beatles musician has smoked the herbal drug since the band's hey day in the 60s, but has given up marijuana so he can be a better parent to his eight-year-old daughter, Beatrice, his child with ex-wife Heather Mills.

He told Rolling Stone magazine: "I did a lot, and it was enough. I smoked my share.

"When you're bringing up a youngster, your sense of responsibility does kick in. Enough's enough - you just don't seem to think it's necessary."

Heroin and cocaine

Paul - who is now married to American heiress Nancy Shevell - has previously confessed to using cocaine and trying heroin once when he was in The Beatles.

Speaking about his experiences with the drugs in a magazine interview in 2004, he said: "I tried heroin just the once. Even then, I didn't realise I'd taken it. I was just handed something, smoked it, then found out what it was.

"It didn't do anything for me, which was lucky because I wouldn't have fancied heading down that road.

"I did cocaine for about a year around the time of Sgt. Pepper...

"Coke and maybe some grass to balance it out. I was never completely crazy with cocaine."

Prison

"I'd been introduced to it and at first it seemed OK, like anything that's new and stimulating. When you start working your way through it, you start thinking, 'Mmm, this is not so cool an idea,' especially when you start getting those terrible comedowns."

Paul and his first wife Linda - who passed away in 1998 - both used to smoke dagga, but he was given a wake up call when he was put in prison for nine days in 1981, for trying to take the drug into Japan during a tour.

Of his ordeal, he said: "I kept thinking, 'What have I done to my family?' I was thrown into nine days of turmoil. It was very, very scary."

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