A 'SPIN doctor' is to be employed to help Lancashire County Council improve the image of its controversial parking wardens.

It comes a day after the Lancashire Telegraph revealed that a press officer had been appointed to deal exclusively with the Building Schools for the Future (BSF) programme.

Both BSF, a £250million school building programme, and Park Wise have come in for severe criticism in the past.

Since its introduction in September 2004 Parkwise wardens have been branded overzealous and the Lancashire Telegraph has reported a number of blunders, such as when a bus was given a ticket at a bus stop.

Chiefs at County Hall said as well as being a press officer, the person who takes up the £23,000 role will be expected to keep district councils up-to-date on developments and overhaul the scheme's website and leaflets.

But an opposition councillor said that if the council got things right to start with it would not need to draft in people to "spin positive angles on negative stories".

It would take 766 tickets at £30 a time to pay for the new job's annual salary which will be funded from the Parkwise budget.

And according to the latest available figures the Parkwise scheme was still in the red by £227,000 in December.

Interviews have already been held for the position and a candidate is due to take up the job next month.

The 'communications' officer will be responsible for writing regular articles in the council's newspaper, Vision, putting out press releases, and answering press calls.

There are already seven press officers working for the council.

Parkwise is operated across the county by NCP on behalf of the county and district councils.

Coun David Whipp, leader of the Liberal Democrats, said: "My heart sinks that the county council is stuffed full of news management people.

"If they did things correctly then they would not need people to spin it and clear up after them."

A spokesman for the county council said: "For a project so big, the scheme has had very little dedicated communications support since its launch.

"This is something that has come in for criticism and may have hindered some aspects of the scheme's operation so far."

The post is not an additional member of staff as it was a re-designation of an old post where someone had left, said chiefs.

The BSF press officer, Miles Barter, is being paid £11,000 over six months, for the three-day-a-week post.