A COUNTY councillor is to make a formal complaint to police after he risked his own safety directing traffic around roadworks in the centre of Rawtenstall.

Tony Winder, who owns Antony and Patricia's hair salon, in Rawtenstall, decided to act after the temporary lights got stuck on red causing huge tailbacks along Burnley Road.

County Coun Winder, who lives in Rawtenstall, said: “As well as my own safety to think about, if anything had happened, such as a bump or accident, it would have been on my head.

“I contacted the police because I thought it was something they should have dealt with, but nobody turned up.

"It was left to myself and a resident. I am now making an official complaint.”

It is thought vandals caused the lights to fail last Monday evening.

County Coun Winder and his helper spent more than half-an-hour in the middle of the road signalling motorists around the roadworks, which had closed one lane.

Coun Winder said: “I got a number of complaints about the traffic signals, so I gave the police and an engineer a call to see if they could do anything about it.

"While I was waiting, I took a walk down to the site and could see the situation was getting out of hand. With the help of a resident, we started to signal the traffic through to try and relieve the problem.”

A police spokesman confirmed they received a report about the faulty lights and officers were sent He said: “However, due to the heavy build-up of traffic because of the fault with the lights, the patrol was unable to reach the location.

"A second patrol attended the scene and contacted the engineer responsible for the temporary lights.

"There were no incidents reported to police as a result of the fault with the lights that evening.”