A SCHOOLGIRL whose mother abandoned her to start a new life abroad said last night it was the best thing that has ever happened to her.

Fifteen-year-old Laura Wilthew was shocked when she returned home one day in July to find her mother, Elaine Walker, and sister Stacey, 17, had stripped the family house and moved to Turkey - without warning her.

The scandal made international headlines, and Miss Walker, from Redmire, near Leyburn, in North Yorkshire, was accused of being a monster by her teenage daughter.

But now, seven weeks after she was abandoned, Laura has been reunited with the father she had been banned from seeing for five years.

Laura and her father, George Wilthew, had last seen each other when she was ten, when Miss Walker walked out on Mr Wilthew, her husband for a decade.

But father and daughter were brought back together by social services after Miss Walker moved to Turkey.

Last night, speaking from their home in Louisa Street, Darlington, Laura said: "I just want to make a clean break and get on with my new life.

"When my mum left my dad, she told me I wasn't allowed to see him ever again, and I was so upset I used to cry every night.

"But this is the best thing that has ever happened to me in my life, because I am back with my dad."

Mr Wilthew and his partner, Diane McDowell, were on holiday in Turkey themselves when they heard about the abandonment.

Mr Wilthew said: "I was on the phone to my son, Peter, who was telling me about it when the news came on, and I saw her on the TV.

"It was a shock and I was surprised because people just don't leave their kids."

Laura said she was nervous when she learned she was to meet her father again.

She said: "Social services got me his number and I had really bad butterflies because I hadn't spoken to him for five years. But as soon as I saw him he was so nice and so was Diane. He was gobsmacked when he saw me."

Ms McDowell, who has been in a relationship with Mr Wilthew for three-and-a-half years, said: "He always talked about Laura and wanted to see her again, so he is very happy now."

On the night Miss Walker left Mr Wilthew, Laura wrote her father a note, which read: "I am so sorry for what mam has done to you. Someday we will get her back for what she has done to us. Love you to bits dad, and you will be alright with me Grandad. Love you with all my heart, Laura."

Mr Wilthew kept the letter and picture in his wallet for five years - and when he showed it to his daughter when they were reunited, she burst into tears.

Earlier this month, on the first day of the new school term, Mr Wilthew drove Laura back to her old school, Wensleydale School, in Leyburn, but she broke down, unable to return to a place with such bad memories.

So this week she started at Eastbourne Comprehensive, in Darlington, just around the corner from her new home.

The family would like to see Miss Walker prosecuted.

Yesterday, a Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) spokeswoman said: "At this stage there will not be a prosecution, but it doesn't mean there never will be, they can always be reinvestigated.

"As far as CPS is concerned, we are not involved."

Laura has not heard from her mother or sister since they moved to Turkey to be with their holiday romance boyfriends.