THE leader of Rossendale council has admitted more needs to be done to get the borough back on its feet following a disappointing government rating.

Peter Steen's comments came following a visit he and Chief Executive Owen Williams made to Minister for Local and Regional Government Nick Raynsford in Whitehall.

The authority was given a 'poor' rating - the lowest possible - by the Audit Commission at the start of this year in the first round of Comprehensive Performance Assessments (CPA) carried out on all district councils over the last year.

The blow came after council bosses were left reeling when a Corporate Governance Inspection in 2002 ranked Rossendale worst of 237 councils in the country.

In a letter to the authority Mr Raynsford said he recognised some improvements had been made but that more needed to be done, especially in the areas of political leadership and financial management.

He said: "Your current satisfaction rating of 27 per cent demands strenuous effort to both improve services in ways the public will notice, and to turn around the present negative perceptions of the council."

He added: "More effort needs to be made to identify budget savings well before the start of the financial year."

Coun Steen told a meeting of the authority's executive: "We must be positive and support the council officers and work with them as a team. We must give leadership and set policies.

"The area of financial management is still not fully resolved and there are difficulties which we are working on. We need to pull on the same end of the rope."

Neighbouring authorities of Burnley and Pendle were rated 'good'.