GREEN campaigners are to fight plans to widen the M65 - claiming that money should be spent improving East Lancashire's public transport instead.

And Graham Carter, the Green Party's prospective candidate for the Blackburn constituency, plans to turn the proposals - revealed by the Lancashire Evening Telegraph last week - into an election issue.

Blackburn with Darwen Council and Lancashire County Council are pushing the Government to fund expansion of the M65 into three lanes from beginning to end.

Currently, the only stretch not to have three lanes is the newest part - running from the M6 to Whitebirk - which was opened in 1997 and amid predictions that it would be free-flowing for at least 15 years.

But just seven years on, several stretches of the motorway, particularly around the Shadsworth area of Blackburn, are gridlocked at rush hour, with Highways Agency reports suggesting gridlock and serious accidents will be commonplace by 2012.

The Government is likely to listen to the councils' request because they are arguing for an expansion on economic grounds as part of Deputy Prime Minister John Prescott's 'Northern Way' initiative, meant to help close the north-south divide.

Infrastructure along the two-lane section - such as bridges - has been designed to cope with a third lane, if needed.

However, Mr Carter said: "This will destroy more green land, ruin more farms, bulldoze more houses and only in the end serve very short-term gain.

"It will also encourage people to drive more.

"This means they will be pumping out dangerous emissions from cars, which are destroying the earth.

"More roads simply means more car traffic. If just a quarter of the road budget was spent on public transport so much more could be achieved, including cutting bus and rail fares.

"That would be money well spent. We also know that most journeys are a local ones, and could decent public transport would be a solution."

Blackburn MP Jack Straw is pursuing improvements to the M65 with the Department for Transport.

A spokesman for the Highways Agency said: "Widening the M65 is something we are looking at. "