A CHARITY worker who set fire to his former best friend's flat in a drunken rage was jailed for two years yesterday.

Liam Thomas, 21, of Midfield View, Stockton, drank more than 15 pints of an alcoholic mix called Diesel during a friend's 21st birthday celebration.

Thomas, who had fallen out with a friend, then went to his flat and started a fire, causing thousands of pounds worth of damage.

He told police he could remember nothing about the blaze in Chalk Walk, Stockton, where a man was sleeping.

A jury at Teesside Crown Court found him guilty of arson with intent to endanger life in July last year.

Thomas was a worker for the Society for Mental Illness, Depression and Schizophrenia and for Child Advocacy International, said Stephen Constantine, in mitigation.

"This was a one-off act of madness committed when he was severely intoxicated," he said.

"This current epidemic of binge drinking which one sees in the media is something which cannot be controlled, but he has begun to get it under control because the frequency of his visits to pubs and clubs has diminished."

Recorder of Middlesbrough Judge Peter Fox QC told Thomas: "I accept that when sober you are a very decent young man.

"You come from a respectable family, a good many people have written excellent things about you, and you have for some significant time done good charitable work for two important charities.

"That night you were binge drinking, you had a vast amount to drink, and that was not uncommon for you."