GREAT Harwood-born Janet Entwistle is celebrating a 'champagne moment' after being named as one of Britain's top business women.

The former Clitheroe Royal Grammar School for Girls pupil is on a shortlist of just five for the prestigious Veuve Clicquot Business Woman of the Year Award for 2003.

The high-flying executive is the general manager of BT Fleet - the vehicle fleet management arm of British Telecom which she has transformed into a national business with a £200million turnover and a workforce of 720.

"I was thrilled when I find out I was on the shortlist," said Janet, who will be better remembered among her old friends in East Lancashire under her maiden name Draper. "It is quite an achievement to get so far and it has been an interesting experience."

She now has an anxious wait for the glittering awards ceremony at Claridges in London on April 29 to find out if she will collect the top prize and follow in the footsteps of icons such as Bodyshop founder Anita Roddick.

Janet was brought up in the Edge End area of Great Harwood and after taking her 0-Levels at Clitheroe Grammar, she went to Accrington and Rossendale College for her A-Levels.

After graduating in law from Reading University, she qualified as a barrister and worked for 10 years in industry in London. After moving to BT, where she worked as a lawyer, she eventually made the jump to general management and found herself in charge of its fleet management division five years ago.

The first priority was to improve the level of service to BT, but after her division was named Fleet Operator of the Year Janet started thinking about turning it into a business in its own right.

"In the past 12 months we really started doing it seriously," she said from her base in Birmingham where she controls a network of 88 garages throughout the country, including one in Sumner Street, Blackburn, which covers East Lancashire. "We have now built up a client base of more than 100 external customers and numbers are growing."

Janet stills returns to Lancashire to see her father, John Draper, who retired to the Fylde Coast, and other relatives who are dotted around the county.

In the final, Janet is up against Linda Bennett, the founder of the L.K. Bennett store chain; Mandy Haberman, an inventor and entrepreneur; Penny Streeter, founder of the employment group Ambition 24hours; and Cynthia Wilkinson, managing director of a furniture group.