ONE third of a council's services have got worse in the last 12 months, a new report has revealed.

Poor performing areas within Blackburn with Darwen Council include time taken processing benefit claims, the percentage of council tax collected, the amount of household waste recycled and the number of planning applications determined in eight weeks.

A total of 77 performance indicators taken from across the council are compared with those from every other unitary authority in the country.

Of the 77 indictors produced for 2001/2002, 52 per cent are better than last year, 33 per cent are worse and 15 per cent have remained the same.

As a result, the council has more performance indicators in the top 25 per cent -- 33 per cent compared to 25 per cent in 2000/01 -- and 19 per cent described as above average, compared to 22 per cent the year before.

A total of five per cent of services met the average of all unitary authorities, compared with two per cent in 2000/01 and 18 per cent were below average, compared with 22 per cent last year.

And 25 per cent of services were among the worst in the country.

The figures have been produced for the council's overview and scrutiny committee so that councillors know areas of the authority they need to keep under review for the future.

Councillor John Milburn, executive member for resources, who is responsible corporately for best value, said: "I am very pleased to see that overall the council's performance has improved with 52 per cent of our indicators better than the previous year and on top of that 33 per cent of our indicators are comparable with the best in the country.

"However there are still some areas where the Council is not performing as well as it can and I am sure these will be addressed through individual service action plans.

"By presenting this information to our scrutiny committees we are showing in a much more transparent way exactly how the Council is performing.

"These forums give the public and scrutiny members the opportunity to see for themselves exactly where improvements need to be made and ask questions if they are not made.

"The new decision-making and scrutiny structure is giving everyone the chance to have a real say in improving services and I for one believe that is a very positive move for this Council."