The mother of a boy who died after taking a legal high in in turmoil after a government minister heading a review into the substances announced his resignation.

Norman Baker, the Lib Dem crime prevention minister, announced he is resigning from the Government today after a year of internal battles and disagreements with Theresa May, the Home Secretary.

Mr Baker launched a major review into legal highs after 20-year-old Jimmy Guichard suffered a heart attack and severe brain damage within hours of taking synthetic cannabis believed to have been bought from a Chatham Shop.

He was living in Gravesend at the time and died at Darent Valley Hospital, Dartford.

His mother Karen Audino has been campaigning for the substances to be banned and this summer Mr Baker’s evidence was presented to the government, including stats that legal highs were linked to the deaths of 68 people in England and Wales in 2012.

Mr Baker said: “We want to criminalise those people who are making money out of misery and we want to see head shops shut across the country.”

But with him gone Karen Audino, who had to make the heartbreaking decision to turn of her son’s life support machine last year, said: “I want to know where this leaves us. Will we have to go all the way back to square one?

“Hopefully it won’t change anything as the release has already been put out there, but I don’t think the Conservatives were particularly impressed with the report. I spoke to Norman Baker regularly and he looked into it with more of an open mind than they were prepared for.

“I think they were hoping just to be able to treat legal highs like cigarettes, maybe jut tax them for a bit more money.”

MPs debated a possible shift in the coalition’s policy on drugs in the House of Commons on Thursday last week, during which Mr Baker also accused the Conservatives of shelving the research for months.

Mrs Audino, 43, added: “Somebody should have come back and said something about what changes are going to be put in place or at least given a date by which things changes will have been agreed.

“I was disappointed to see how few MPs turned out to the Commons for the debate as well, at one point I counted just 16, so they obviously don’t think it’s that important.

“My fear is that the Conservatives will sit on this and use it during the election in May.

“Every week that goes by more children are taking this stuff and dying at a rate of more than one per week.

“We’re talking about the lives of almost 30 people between now and May, just so they can score points.”

Mrs Audino has pledged to continue lobbying people on the issue and will be meeting with United Communities Against Drugs(UCAD) to organise holding protests across Ireland, Scotland, Wales and in London.

UCAD was set up after Jimmy’s death last year and covers education, intervention, and service relating to drugs and legal highs in particular.

She added: “I had a woman from Devon message me the other day because her daughter was on life support after taken a legal high.

“She was asking all the questions I was with Jimmy, ‘have the doctors done everything they can?’, ‘is there any hope at all?’.

“I will just keep fighting. I’m grateful for this campaign and speaking to the Messenger to start it all off because it’s given me a focus, without it all I would be doing is wallowing in grief.”