PENDLE MP Gordon Prentice has stepped up his campaign to ensure all his constituents receive the new digital TV broadcast before the existing service is switched off.

He said that parts of his constituency received only broadcasts from Yorkshire - missing out on vital North West news from Granada and the BBC in Manchester.

He said a quarter of them, in West Craven, never saw him on the box, although he accepted it could be a mixed blessing for the other 75 per cent who could view him.

Mr Prentice said after raising the issue in a special debate on regional broadcasting: "I am not prepared for us to be viewed as country cousins - either in West Craven or in Pendle more generally.

"Too many people in my area cannot get Channel Five or hook up to the Cable networks.

"To cap it all, digital terrestrial television could pass us by unless we force the broadcasters to address the issue seriously."

Broadcasting minister and Rossendale and Darwen MP Janet Anderson said the government was considering how best to ensure that everyone could enjoy digital TV and had to make sure that when the existing analogue services were switched off no one lost out.

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