IN A week when the North West Regional Development Agency launches its work to bring more investment into the region, Reporter PAUL SMITH has been investigating how councillors in East Lancashire are working to make sure the area's voice is heard just as loudly as those elsewhere in the North West. Part one of his INSIGHT special report looks at the hopes and aims of a new group set up to co-ordinate the efforts of the area's six councils. Tomorrow we look at how it is hoped the quality of life of East Lancashire people will be improved by the region's councils speaking with one voice instead of six.

THINK of Helsinki, Hanover and Dublin - medium sized and well known European cities with populations of around 500,000 people.

Then think of East Lancashire, also with a population of 500,000, and ask yourself whether people across the continent could pinpoint us on a map the same way they could those three cities.

East Lancashire as we know it today, made up of the districts of Burnley, Blackburn with Darwen, Hyndburn, the Ribble Valley, Hyndburn and Rossendale, is 25 years old in April.

The big local government shake up of 1974 brought the six districts into being, but there has only been limited co-operation between them.

So whereas European cities, with a co-ordinated outlook, have been able to lobby strongly for European money, East Lancashire has often missed out. Now an organisation has been set up to try to carry on the fight for the area, to improve its image, its public transport, its health, its housing conditions, its education and its environment as well as reducing its crime levels.

And, already, the East Lancashire Partnership has been given special so called "Pathfinder" status by the Government, which gives the area the go ahead to try to focus all public money spent in the area on its regeneration.

Why should Sheffield and Manchester have hi-tech tram systems taking traffic congestion from their streets when East Lancashire has an equal population to both of those cities and just as pressing a need for public transport improvements?

Why should Manchester and Liverpool receive millions of pounds from Europe and Westminster when East Lancashire has just as pressing a need for fresh investment?

Indeed, why should cities anywhere always seem to gain more benefit from the areas on their outskirts?

Those are the kind of key issues that the East Lancashire Partnership has been set up to fight for - and all at a time when regions are becoming more and more important in Britain.

The Partnership is one of only 22 areas in the country to be awarded Pathfinder status and is one of only a handful of those 22 not to be based around the city.

A series of visions for the future have been set out by the Partnership and everything is in place to make sure East Lancashire has a unified voice in time for when the new regional development agency for the North West publishes its economic strategy in October.

The first page of the Partnership's draft document says the aim of the group is to work together to "achieve facilities and opportunities equal to the best in European cities of our size." Facts and figures show there is a huge task ahead if the improvements are to be made.

But the six district councils have been joined by the county council, the police, colleges, businesses and training groups to make a determined joint effort - for the first time since East Lancashire, as we know it today, came into being in 1974.

Roger Ellis, the chief executive of Burnley Council, is deeply involved in the Partnership and the Pathfinder project.

He explained: "The aim to to have a similar approach to many of the European countries when it comes to regeneration by having all the agencies which spend public money work together to look at underlying issues.

"We aren't proposing anything like merging Blackburn and Burnley but these places have got a lot in in common and by working together we can get further.

John Tilley of the East Lancashire Partnership added: "The vision is to close the gap between where we are and where we want to be. And that is just in comparison to other parts of the UK, which, as a whole, are some way behind Europe and the USA in many areas.

"We will get there because there is a strong sense of identity in East Lancashire for us to capitalise on.

"We are not a single centred city but there is no reason why that should prove to be a disadvantage for us.

Stephen Barnes, the chief executive of Pendle Borough Council sees the Partnership as a massive breakthrough for the region.

He said: "We need to make our voice louder in the North West. There is no doubt we have lost out in the past through not having a unified voice.

"We have the worst housing in the region in East Lancashire and the Partnership will be the forum we use to lobby for more resources to tackle that and the other problems we face.

Steven Hartley, the chief executive at Rossendale Borough Council, also sees the six councils speaking as one as crucial. He said: "We have to do this. We are very conscious of the fact that Europe and the new regional development agencies are increasingly looking to deal with councils at a sub regional level.

"Each of the six areas of East Lancashire is distinct, but we also have common problems and we must work together to tackle them."

The Ribble Valley is perhaps the most distinct area of East Lancashire in that its housing, crime and public transport problems differ from those in the other five boroughs. But the council's chief planning officer Stewart Bailey says the Partnership will be just as important to the Ribble Valley as anywhere else.

He added: "There is to be the North West Development Agency and the North West Regional Assembly and the fear is they will be dominated by Manchester and Merseyside unless we make sure that towns in East Lancashire have a voice."

Phil Watson, the chief executive of Blackburn with Darwen Council, sees his authority playing a unique role within the Partnership.

"As a new unitary council we have built up relationships with the Greater Manchester councils and see ourselves in a pivotal role between East Lancashire and Greater Manchester.

"This is about moving beyond parochialism and working together. There will still be occasions when we are in competition but by joining together more often the whole will become greater than the sum of the parts."

Mike Chambers, the chief executive of Hyndburn Council, summed up the aspirations of the six councils when he said: "This is all about speaking with a unity for East Lancashire which we know already exists on the ground."

Converted for the new archive on 14 July 2000. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.