BLACKBURN with Darwen Council today came under heavy fire, accused of being rife with spin and of frittering away huge amounts of public money.

Tory leader Councillor Colin Rigby launched his fiercest attack on the council to date and said that in the big areas of policy - housing, health, poverty and education - some of the district's wards were among the worst in the country.

He said: "When will the lessons be learned, that trendy projects, scattergun spending and spin is no replacement for serious long-term investment in jobs, roads, tackling crime and cleaning up the environment?"

He added: "The council has shouted 'Excellent Council' from the rooftops, but we have not heard much about the alternative league table, where we are really up there in the Premiership.

"I am talking about parts of our borough which have the misfortune to be in the top 100 wards nationally for having some of the most serious economic and social problems in the country.

"This is what local people really care about, what they are looking for the 'excellent council' to tackle."

Coun Colin Rigby launched his onslaught on the Labour party's running of the council after the announcement of a programme of priorities for the next year.

The "Performance Agreement" has 18 projects which the council will carry out in 2004 to 2005 in an attempt to improve the lives of residents and improve the delivery of public services.

Coun Rigby welcomed the policy council as an opportunity to debate policies in an open and relaxed setting.

But he said that the policies of the Labour council, which has been in control for 20 years and which recently won joint council of the year, had created division in the borough and short-changed tax-payers, particularly those in rural wards.

"The huge sums of money flowing into the Borough through the Special Regeneration Budgets we believe are being frittered away. They should be used to regenerate manufacturing industry, which in turn will give long term prosperity, which will benefit all the citizens," he said.

Coun Rigby picked out one project called 'Citizen Engagement' for special criticism.

He said: "Citizen engagement seems mainly to be setting up an expensive propaganda machine for putting out spin in the form of community newsletters and extra editions of the Shuttle. This will use up money that should be put towards funding front line services, such as more jobs and reducing crime."

He also slammed the creation of 'neighbourhood co-ordinators', who will be funded by the Neighbourhood Renewal Fund.

"Neighbourhood co-ordinators cost a minimum of £150,000 a year and yet puts another layer of bureaucracy between officers and councillors.

"Money should be spend on civic projects to improve neighbourhoods rather than empire building."

At a meeting of the Policy Council last week Coun Rigby described the programme as "a regurgitation of washed out ideas and misguided initiatives which will further squander council tax payers' cash."

Today Coun Rigby said the drive in the area's politics now needed to focus on education, in particular skills for life and for jobs, to provide a skilled workforce ready to take up the opportunities which flow from housing renewal and result in a reduction of deprivation and poverty.

He railed against the Labour administration's concentration of spending in town centre wards to, what he said, was the detriment of outlying and rural areas.

He said these concerns need to be addressed to stop the British National Party gaining political points as they had in Burnley from perceptions of where and how public money is spent.

"Unless this council changes its policies on spending the BNP will do the same in Blackburn and Darwen as they did in Burnley. That's my major concern, I don't want any BNP here.

"The rural wards have needs that are relatively minor but £40,000 can make a vast difference there rather than £100,000 in a town centre ward such as Audley.

"This is about equality, about some return for Council Tax, which has risen by 60% in five years."