TELEVISION watchers in East Lancashire are among the worst in the country for licence dodging, according to a new "league of shame."

Areas of the county from Blackburn to Barnoldswick, which are covered by the Blackburn BB postcode, have been placed 18th on a league table published by TV Licensing.

The grading represents a rise of 11 places from 29th since the figures were last published six months ago. In that time 2,152 license evaders have been caught.

Neighbouring areas which come under the Preston postcode are placed way down the list in 40th place. TV Licensing spokesman Alyson Mountney said: "We now have the best equipment we have ever had to root out people who are not paying their licence.

"Our vans can tell which channel a person is watching and we have a database which can look up 26 million addresses across the country at the touch of a button.

"To back this up we have hand held, portable detection equipment which are officers can use in cars, so the campaign against television licence evasion is not always as conspicuous as when we relied on vans.

"There does seem to be a problem in East Lancashire and we will be stepping up our activity in the area.

"This should act as a warning to people who have got a licence to do something about it before they get caught."

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