CAMPAIGNERS have been told that they must take the lead if they want to improve three ancient wells in the centre of Clitheroe.

Civic society officials in the town and several councillors have called on Ribble Valley Council to help preserve Stocks Well, Towns Well, which is also known as Heild Well, and St Mary's Well.

Once the three supplies provided Clitheroe with its drinking water but today they are all capped.

While Stocks Well is in the local authority's ownership, the responsibility for the Towns and St Mary's wells is less clear.

In a letter to the council, last October, the town wells working group, which includes civic society chairman Steve Burke and Cllrs Alan Know, Ian Brown and Maureen Fenton, urged officials to back a possible Heritage Lottery Fund scheme to repair and preserve the well, as part of an enhanced town trail.

They insisted that such an approach would sit well with the new Ribble Valley Tourism Management Destination Plan.

"Action to secure the future of this trio of ancient monuments in Lancashire, which lie at the heart of our borough, are considered to be an excellent vehicle to put these admirable policies into practice," they said.

Several documents, some dating back to the the early and mid-20th century have been submitted, claiming the wells fall within the council's portfolio.

But a report to the borough council's community service committee says an 1876 town plan showed St Mary's Well to be outside the holdings of the former borough of Clitheroe, and did not show Heild Well,, in the Wellgate area.

Mark Beveridge, the council's community services director, said it could be argued, if there was no identified owners, that they formed part of the pavements, and should be a Lancashire County Council matter.

But the county council did not want to take on that liability, he added, which left it open for the civic society to form a legal entity, which could assume ownership and bid for Heritage Lottery Fund.

Councillors are being asked to give authorisation for chief executive Marshal Scott to write to the civic society, to inform them of the council's stance, and support any efforts to assume ownership.