A POWER cut in Nelson town centre led to several shops having to turn away customers for health and safety reasons.

Seven or eight shops in Scotland Road, including Cavendish Newsagents, Jane's Boutique and Hargreaves greengrocers, were affected by the fault.

They were without lighting from when they opened -- which was as early as 7.30am for some -- and throughout the morning until 11.25am.

Engineers from Norweb were sent to fix the fault and a temporary supply of electricity was re-routed to the shops.

A spokesman for Norweb said: "The engineers know it was a fault on an under ground cable. They think it is in the Walverden Bridge car park area and managed to re-route the electricity from a different supply.

"At some point either during the weekend or early next week they will need to do some digging to find and make a permanent repair to the fault. We apologise for any inconvenience."

Manageress of Jane's Boutique, Emma Pickering, said: "This has been about the sixth time since Christmas that the power has gone off and it seems to be after it has rained a lot as though something is fusing.

"It is no good because we can't use the lights, the alarm or the tills and being half in the shopping centre it is too dark to see properly. We weren't allowed to let anyone in in case they fell over in the dark or something.

"Friday is supposed to be our busiest day and we usually make about £800 and they are still having to pay us wages as well."