IT'S vital for the prosperity of the town that driving into Blackburn and our other town centres to park and shop is made cheap and hassle free.

The simple fact is that people will do their food and other shopping at edge-of-town stores, where there are no jams or parking charges and trolleys can be pushed straight to the car, unless it is easy to access the town centre shops and market.

Blackburn with Darwen Council's 'free-after-3pm' scheme on the town's market car park was the right sort of idea - specially aimed at making it easy for people to pop in and buy from stalls before they head home for tea.

But today they admit the scheme has been scrapped because it just wasn't helping the market traders at all.

Most of the available 'free' places were being clogged up from 3pm by Capita staff who were moving their cars en masse nearer to their office at no cost.

Former local authority staff who are carrying out traditional council duties for Capita should be forced to realise that their own jobs ultimately depend on the prosperity of the town.

They should be told that such short-term selfishness could cost other people their jobs.

And the council should not reverse a soundly-based policy simply because of what these staff are doing during working hours.