POLICE have asked a security firm to work with them in a move to keep Darwen schools trouble-free this summer.

Officers will team up with WG Securities and Voyager Ltd, of Clarence Street, Darwen, in a trial which could be extended across the six week holiday.

The company, which already monitors all but three of the town's schools every evening on CCTV, will now watch the footage 24 hours a day.

For the first time the security firm will be able to request police back up when they go to investigate incidents.

It is the only link-up of its kind in East Lancashire, and possibly the rest of the country.

Police have taken the action at the start of the summer break to send out a message that attacks on schools will not be tolerated. The Tullyallan School, in Salisbury Road, Darwen, was targeted by two boys aged 13 who set a climbing frame on fire on June 28 after dousing it in petrol.

Last summer many Darwen schools were vandalised during the holidays and police patrols were put on in troubled areas.

The new scheme could allow the schools to be more vigorously policed without taking up officers' time.

WG Securities has provided a CCTV service to Darwen's primary and secondary schools since 1999.

Cameras placed around school grounds are monitored in the evening from a control room in Clarence Street. Previously, if incidents of bad behaviour were spotted, a patrol officer from WG Securities would be sent.

Schools pay WG Securities £2,500 a year for the cover, and the firm's manager Wayne Grundy said it was good value as it could stop thousands of pounds worth of vandalism and theft.

Mr Grundy said that previously troublemakers didn't take much notice.

"Now we will have the police backing us up and we can warn them they could be locked up -- they better watch out! We can become a mini police force.

"This is the first time this has happened and it has taken a bit to get through to the police. As far as I am aware it is unprecedented across the country for the police to come work with a security company in this way."

Police Inspector Graham Ashcroft of Darwen said: "A lot of schools experience things like vandalism and burglaries during the school holidays and it can be a problem for us.

"Under the Crime and Disorder Strategy for Blackburn with Darwen, one of the main concerns of the community was the gathering of gangs of intimidating youths who often use schools as a meeting place. Hopefully this scheme will nip these kind of problems in the bud.

"We are hoping to stamp some of it out early in the holidays. We will see how it goes this weekend and what impact it has before deciding whether to extend it."

The police are receiving the security firm's help for free.