ACTION plans must be implemented urgently to keep Bury's social services budget under control.

The District Auditor says more must be done to stop the department spiralling into the red and provide the services people need.

Social services overspent by almost £400,000 in 2000/01. This year's initial forecast was a £2 million-plus overspend and, says the auditor, up to £4 million for future years if nothing was done.

The auditor says that Bury has worked hard and the situation for 2001/02 will be much better than feared: however, some of the measures taken are only short-term.

He acknowledges that "difficult decisions" have to be taken, for example the future of the council's elderly persons homes. As reported in the Bury Times, bosses are considering transferring up to five of those to outside agencies. The auditor adds: "Unless these and the many other issues identified in the council's plans are addressed, not only will it be impossible for the council to maintain expenditure within budget provision, it will also prove extremely difficult to respond to service users' real needs in an appropriate manner."

Mark Sanders, the council's chief executive, said the comments had been taken on board.

"One of them is the well-documented problem of providing social services in response to the heavy demands of identified need and new legislation while keeping within budget," he said.

"The auditors agreed that we have worked hard to identify solutions and they, like us, are confident that in the short term the situation will be much improved.

"However, that is not good enough and we will be working even harder to address underlying difficulties and develop the necessary action plans for the future.

"They have made it clear that we need to shift the balance away from residential care and focus more on care in the home. Discussions to do that have already taken place and are currently on-going."

THE auditor has also called on Bury to develop an ICT (information and communication technology) strategy in the next six months.

Mr Sanders said this was being done, and the council was optimistic of winning £200,000 to upgrade its computer systems. It also planned to provide free Internet access at all local libraries by next year.