POLICE have intercepted a number of birthday cards containing cannabis from the Royal Mail sorting office in Swindon.

The cards, addressed to different people around the country, contained around two grams of cannabis. Police were alerted by staff who managed to smell the Class-B drug through the envelope.

One was addressed to Frankie wishing him a happy birthday, adding "happy smoke day" and "get high Frankie".

Inspector David Tippets, from South Swindon Police, told the Adver the force had intercepted around 30 similar packages in Swindon in the last six months.

"It's normally cannabis, because it's got such a strong smell, if it's in an envelop and there's an obvious lump it gets easily identified," he said.

"Some dealing must go on online but in Swindon we deal with the more traditional methods of dealing, with a customer being supplied directly or by a runner as a cash business.

"Certainly the birthday card we found is still effectively supplying controlled drugs. Money doesn't have to change hands for it to be an offence.

"Generally what we do is seize the item at the sorting office and it gets destroyed and we record it as intelligence."

Police can have difficulty in tracking down the senders of drugs by post.

It has has become a popular method among dealers who use encrypted online market places to sell and deal drugs which are then concealed in harmless-looking packages and cards.