Amy Winehouse and Blake are killing each other,says her mother-in-law

Amy promised to throw a big family party to celebrate when they returned home, to appease their parents.

This never happened. Instead, three weeks ago, Amy was taken to hospital by Blake at 1am after a drugs binge.

Georgette found out only when a friend read about it in the paper and called her.

"We spent all day trying to get hold of Blake, with no success, and the next day we had a call from Mitch to say she'd been in hospital and that the pair of them had a problem that we needed to address," recalls Georgette.

"We were frantic with worry and the next day we raced to the Four Seasons hotel in Hook, Hampshire, for a very hastily arranged emergency summit with Blake and Amy.

"Mitch, Amy's stepmother Jane and mother Janis were also there.

"We arrived on the Friday night and the others on Saturday morning.

"When we went out onto the hotel terrace to say good morning to Amy, Blake, Mitch and Janis, by the look of anger on Mitch's face we could see he was unhappy about something.

"He launched straight into a torrent of abuse at Giles, shouting that everything was Blake's fault, then he tried to grab him around the throat.

"I was looking on, horrified, while Amy was yelling at her dad to get off Giles. I don't know what prompted it, but I do know that we had done nothing to deserve it."

Today, Mitch Winehouse refuses to blame Blake publicly, saying that Amy is responsible for her own predicament, but sources say that in private Amy's family feel very bitter towards her new husband, feeling he has drawn her into a drug-fuelled world from which she cannot escape.

Was that the reason for the altercation?

Georgette recalls: "Amy apologised profusely for her dad's behaviour, and Mitch has since apologised unreservedly, but it's just not acceptable behaviour.

"We thought it was going to be a private meeting between two families worried sick about their children, but Amy's manager was there and four people claiming to be her friends. I'd call them hangers-on.

"We didn't ask for the tragedy of our son's drug addiction to be played out so publicly, but that is the beast we are dealing with because of Amy's fame and we are doing our best to deal with it.

"We are still coming to terms with the fact that our son is a drug addict. It is very hard to accept.

"At that hotel in Hook, I tried to talk to Blake privately, but every time I went outside for a cigarette with him, one of these "friends" of Amy would appear. My son said he felt he wasn't being allowed to speak.

"He told me he'd even been banned from seeing his wife in hospital by Mitch and these friends - when he was the one who'd taken her there and probably saved her life.

"Eventually, at around one in the morning we went to our room and Blake and Amy came with us. She ordered hot chocolate and cakes and when we pushed them for answers, they admitted they were recreational drug users but insisted they were in control.

"They admitted taking cocaine, and nothing else.

"But we have since learned they have taken crack and probably heroin, which is very hard for us, as parents, to come to terms with.

"We have never asked them outright if they use heroin because we are frightened of what the answer will be.

"Amy was insistent that it had all been blown out of proportion and was fed up of everyone interfering in their lives. It became clear to me that neither realised their drug use was the big problem it really was."

Under parental pressure, Amy and Blake agreed to enter the Causeway Clinic in Essex on the weekend of August 11 for rehab, but fled to London after just a few days.

Then came the photographs following their bust-up in the capital. Amy was pictured with a bruised neck, make-up smeared over her face, cuts on her arms and blood seeping through her satin ballet pumps, while Blake's face was a criss-cross of deep scratches.

Again, Blake was blamed after it was reported he chased Amy through the streets of Soho before she flagged down a car and was driven away by strangers.

Amy has since insisted the fight was all her fault and that Blake had once again saved her life.

Wiping away tears, she revealed just how troubled a diva she really is by saying: "I'm nothing without my husband. I love him so much sometimes it hurts. I owe him everything. Without him I would be nothing.

"I can't beat the drugs without him. He's my rock...I know I need help, but Blake is the only one who can help me. I don't want to lose him. I won't lose him.

"I feel disgusting and Blake's the only person who stops me feeling like this. I don't deserve him."

But the Civils believe - like Amy's family - that the couple would be better off apart.

Says Georgette: "Those photographs were incredibly distressing for us to see as Blake's parents. This wasn't the life we'd wished for him.

"Do I think Amy and Blake can ever be clean?

"I think Blake could be drug-free separately, but together they are just feeding off one another."

In a show of parental support, the Civils have decided to buy a second home close to them, so that at any time he wants, Blake - and Amy, too, if she chooses - can move away from London.

"Our greatest wish is for them to go to a proper clinic abroad and deal with their demons.

"If they came back clean, people would have so much admiration for them. It's up to them now to take responsibility," says Georgette.

"Blake may see this interview as an act of betrayal on my part, but I've done it because we love him.

"If it prompts him to channel any anger he feels into getting clean then it will have been well worth it, even if the price I pay is that he never speaks to me again.

"At least my son will be alive.

"For now we have to accept the harsh reality that there's nothing more we can do for them."