The mother of a young man who died from taking drugs at an iconic music festival has urged attendees to make use of the on-site drugs-testing service available.

Debbie Pay, from Millom, issued a warning to this year's revellers after her son Christian died in 2015 at Kendal Calling after taking a rogue ecstasy pill.

Debbie, who has given this publication to use her social media, said: "This is a picture taken of Christian Pay at Kendal Calling the night before he passed away.

News and Star: Christian Pay the night before he diedChristian Pay the night before he died

"He bought what he thought were E's (ecstasy pills) at the festival and died around 10 hours later.

"Everyone going to Kendal Calling please try not to use drugs but if you do, get them tested first - you don't know what's in them.

"A lot of the time they are not made of what you think.

"Don't be the next person to die because of drugs."

READ MORE: Mother makes heartfelt plea a year after Millom teen's Kendal Calling death

Campaign group The Loop has operated a behind-the-scenes drug testing service at Kendal Calling since 2014.

Director of The Loop and Professor of Criminology at Liverpool University Fiona Measham said: "The Loop has a lab on-site near the police compound, and we will test seizures, confiscations, and people surrendering substances to the amnesty bin.

"We will test those substances that are in circulation before and on-site so we can find out if there are any particular substances of concern, and then we put out alerts on our Twitter account, and the festival and police will pick that up.

"If there's anything particularly strong which could lead to an overdose, or if we find any pills or powders which are not what people actually hope to buy, but with adulterants that dealers have added, we will put out alerts.

"We are doing this behind the scenes with the full support of the festival and police, and also Debbie Pay.

"Every day, we have meetings on-site and the agencies feed back results, so if people have taken any of these substances, then the medics and welfare services will know about it, and know what to look out for, and the added value of that is that they can treat people more accurately.

"People can also present more quickly if they see our alerts, and think 'I've taken some of that already', they can go to the medical services, so hopefully, hospital treatment is less likely to be needed, and ultimately lead to less stress on the NHS - it's win-win for everybody."

Visit The Loop's Twitter page for up-to-date alerts throughout the festival.

READ MORE: Drugs sniffed out at Kendal Calling