Two drug addict parents have been jailed over the death of their toddler who swallowed methadone they had left lying around at home.

Two-year-old Brandon Davies drank the heroin substitute from a bottle left on a kitchen worktop at the “squalid” flat in March last year.

His parents, 31-year-old Benjamin Davies and Mary Norman, aged 23, were jailed at Birmingham Crown Court after admitting causing or allowing his death. Davies was given a two-year sentence while Norman was jailed for 15 months.

Mrs Justice Macur, sentencing, said: “He was completely dependent on the pair of you. He was a vulnerable child in so many respects.”

The court heart that the defendants knew Brandon had swallowed the methadone, prescribed for Davies, at their home in Bentmead Grove, Kings Norton, on March 10, but failed to call an ambulance until the next morning.

In a police statement, Norman said she shouted to her partner to call the emergency services after realising Brandon had drunk the substance but said he refused. She said Davies held Brandon over the sink and put his fingers down the child’s throat to encourage him to be sick and assured her he had brought the substance back up.

Mrs Justice Macur said if an ambulance had been called immediately, the youngster might have survived. In a police statement read out to the court, Norman said: “It is my deepest regret that I did not call an ambulance immediately and something that will haunt me for the rest of my life.”

Davies was also jailed for 18 months after pleading guilty to handling stolen property, giving him a total sentence of three-and-a-half years. Both defendants admitted a separate cruelty charge and were sentenced concurrently.