Residents to get e-mail address

Council chiefs will be using part of a £25million grant they recently received from the government to fund the project.

People who live in the Audley, Queen's Park, Whitebirk, Intack and College areas of the town will be among those who benefit as the council attempts to bring the information superhighway to residents in deprived areas.

And in a separate development, Blackburn with Darwen's library service has won £70,000 to install computers in each of the area's libraries to provide internet access and training facilities for the whole family.

The council has won a government grant which will see computers fitted by February or March 2000, not only at the central library in Blackburn, but also at branch libraries throughout the borough.

Computers fitted at the central library will be available for all residents in the central area of town so they can make use of their new e-mail addresses.

Council access points and eventually community centres will also be equipped with computers for public use and will be used as drop in centres and set up in a similar way to internet cafes.

A council spokeswoman stressed that it would be some time before people actually received their e-mail addresses.

She added: "It is all part of the council's strategy to bring information technology to everybody in the borough, which is part of the reason why we were so delighted to get the single regeneration budget grant in the first place."

Ian Sutton, the library service information development manager said of the £70,000 award: "This grant is very good news and we are one of only three library services in the whole of the north of England to have been successful.

"The emphasis will be on family learning and people will be able to use the computers for anything from the internet to drawing up a CV.

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