IT'S all the fault of bad drivers, wails regeneration supremo Councillor Ashley Whalley over the opening of Blackburn's new orbital route being blighted by confusion and cars going the wrong way on one of its stretches.

Motorists should read the signs, he says.

But there aren't enough of them, critics reply.

Yet, the fact is that this new road system is a total pig's ear -- you only have to look at a map of it to see that it's more of a cobbled-together labyrinth than anything deserving the description of a proper orbital route.

If Coun Whalley has to stick up for it and pretend that it's all nice and dandy, that's his hard luck -- and look-out if fed-up, slagged-off motorists are voters in his patch.

But he would earn a drop or two of sympathy from one and all, if he was bold enough to round on the ones really responsible for this mess -- the present government and past ones which have spent more than 30 years steering resources away from the building of a proper inner ring road in Blackburn.

And the fact that a bit of the makeshift mess of one that the town has now got is named after a Cabinet minister of one of those governments only rubs in the insult.