COUNCIL tax payers in East Lancashire are much less likely to be interested in the political feuding going on between County Hall and newly-independent Blackburn with Darwen over the size of their bills next April than in the differences in impact on their pockets.

And what a difference!

Self-run Blackburn's council tax is set to go up by 5.5 per cent.

In Blackpool, which has also won home rule, it may not go up at all.

But in the rest of Lancashire, where the County Council still dominates local government, bills are going up by thumping 15 per cent.

Cash-wise, that means householders in Blackburn and Darwen will pay an average of £46 more while elsewhere in our region council tax will rocket by £120.

Why is there such a disparity - when, though the providers are now different, the services are basically the same?

That question is the cue for the war of words now threatening to split the Labour rulers of County Hall and Blackburn.

But if, as the County chiefs claim, their bills are going up because of the cost of the reorganisation caused by the breakaways of Blackburn and Blackpool, why are not those of these new unitary authorities rising as steeply? After all, the shake-up has cost them a packet, too. Does not the glaring gap in charges reflect something else - that, management-wise and cost-wise, single-tier local government is better?

And, certainly, in this instance, the homes in Lancashire, covered by the old two-tier system that makes the County Council the collector of 80 per cent of their council tax bills, seem to be suffering for something else.

Namely, the way in which county finances have been padded in the past by the sale of assets. Now, it seems, that, just as the Tory government found itself running out of things to privatise, Lancashire's family silver has all been sold off and the buffer-effect on the County's council tax is no longer there.

From here on, then, County Hall and the new unitary councils are in a straight fight over which is more efficient. Despite its cries about foul blows, Lancashire looks to have lost the first round heavily on points.

It had better beware. For repeat performances in the years ahead might rouse the county's remaining district councils and an observant government to dust off the option that was ditched during the last shake-up of local government - that of doing away with the County Council completely.

Converted for the new archive on 14 July 2000. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.