COUNCIL cash cuts mean Blackburn with Darwen could lose 16 police community support officers, Lancashire crime commissioner Clive Grunshaw has confirmed.

He said none of the officers would lose their jobs because the borough had withdrawn its £178,000 contribution to their cost.

But Mr Grunshaw could not guarantee they would remain in the borough and said chief constable Steve Finnigan would be able to deploy them elsewhere in the county.

He was responding to a plea from borough neighbourhoods boss, Cllr Arshid Mahmood, at Blackburn with Darwen Full Council to keep at least eight of the PCSOs in the borough despite the authority withdrawing its portion of the funding for their work.

For the last six years the council had paid £11,100 for each of the 16 officers who are among the 38 operating across the two towns.

Mr Grunshaw said: “None of the PCSOs will lose their jobs.

“We have vacancies elsewhere for six and my portion of their funding will pay for the other 10.

“It will be an operational decision for the chief constable where they are deployed and I cannot guarantee it will be in Blackburn with Darwen.”

Sudell Liberal Democrat, Cllr Roy Davies, said: “This is not good enough.

“These PCSOs are needed in the borough and I shall lobby the council to reverse this cut and Mr Grunshaw to retain the officers in the Blackburn and Darwen.”

As Thursday’s meeting confirmed its plans to slash £48million from its budget over three years including cutting bus subsidies, chief executive Harry Catherall revealed the expected 500 further town hall job losses by 2020 was now expected to be just 320.

Tory group leader, Cllr John Slater, accused the council of wasting millions of pounds on overspent projects such as Blackburn bus station, the Pennine Reach public transport scheme and the Junction Four Skatepark.

Borough finance chief, Cllr Andy Kay, said: “We will be lobbying the commissioner and chief constable to keep as many of these PCSOs as possible in the borough.

“We have managed to reduce job losses by savings and efficiencies elsewhere and redeployment.” Regeneration boss, Cllr Phil Riley, said: “We do not run bus services, we can only try to enable them.”