PEOPLE in Blackburn with Darwen have been labelled the most idle in the North West, with fewer than 20 per cent taking regular exercise.

Blackburn with Darwen borough has been named as the most inactive in the North West - and the tenth worst in England.

The couch potato' tag came with a new survey by Sport England which says that in the borough only 16.5 per cent of people take regular exercise.

Blackburn with Darwen council said the results showed they had to work harder to persuade people to become more active.

The Active People Survey, the UK's largest ever survey of exercise levels, investigated the numbers of people who take their recommended 30 minutes exercise three days a week.

Despite falling in the bottom 25 percent of the country for regular exercise, Blackburn with Darwen was above the national average for the numbers of people who volunteer at least one hour of their time to support sports activities.

Councillor John Milburn, executive member for leisure and culture, said: "Although the Sport England survey highlights that we all need to make sure we keep active and increase our daily physical exercise for our health, there are a lot of positives that we can take out of it.

"Volunteering levels in Blackburn with Darwen, to help run community sports and other healthy activities, are high. Also, 74.5% of local people have said they are satisfied with sport provision in the borough.

"When you consider that this figure should improve further with the completion of the multi-million pound sports facilities in Darwen as well as other schemes in the borough this survey has a lot of positives."