A DARWEN construction company has pledged to donate profits in a bid to make the town's youth cafe become a reality.

As well as donating £100, Moore Construction, of Limes Avenue, will give a percentage of the profits from each job they do.

Lynne Moore of the company said: "Darwen desperately needs something like this and we hope that more companies will follow suit. We have four boys ourselves and think it's a great idea."

Now project co-ordinators are hoping other Darwen companies will take Moore Constructions lead and contribute to the youth cafe, which as well as being a cyber cafe, will be a place where youngsters can go to for help and advice.

The project was the inspiration of a well-known community activist in the town, Lillian Scott, and although Lillian died a year ago her family have taken up the cafe cause.

Premises for the cafe have been found at the Babywise building in Wood Street but cash is needed to secure the site and £100,000 is needed in total for the building.

Lillian's daughter Karen Bradley is chair of the cafe steering committee and her brother Peter Scott is vice-chair.

Karen said: "My mother was quite a character and left a very big gap, all of us have got together to fill that, if this project works because of that it will be a good thing. The cafe is desperately needed -- we have tried everything else."

She said that instead of events being organised by adults for teenagers the cafe would give youngsters a chance to develop their own personalities.

It is hoped that bodies such as the Brook Advisory Service and organisations which offer drug and solvent abuse counselling services will also be able to operate from the cafe.

Karen said: "This building can have lots of different faces."

She is writing to primary and high schools in the area to get them involved and says that the cafe will also have a homework room in it.

The cafe will be mainly aimed at 13 to 18-year-olds but Karen is keen that younger children are also made aware of it.

She is hoping that once the steering committee registers the cafe as a charity it will be able to apply for funding from bodies such as the Lottery Commission, but support from the whole community needs to be shown for the application to be successful.

Karen said: "We are going to push and push for as much as we can get. The cafe is desperately needed."

Fund-rasing for the cafe is on-going and next month there will be a Hallowe'en Party and an open day for parents. There are also plans to hold a sponsored abseil.