TRADING standards officers believe they could have caught one of the main suppliers of fake designer labels in a raid yesterday.

Almost £3,000 worth of counterfeit clothing was discovered in the back of a transit van along with 10,000 designer label tags ready to be sewn on to garments.

Trading standards officers from Burnley made the label seizure along with 200 items of knitwear and men's shirts at Bicknell Street, Blackburn.

The raid came as a result of a number of surveillance operations in the Brookhouse area of the town.

Chris Allen, area manager for Lancashire Trading Standards, said: "We could have found the main supplier of counterfeit labels in Blackburn. "It may be that we have come across the label supplier to lots of smaller operations."

Jumpers, sweatshirts and shirts with labels such as Timberland, Calvin Klein, Lacoste, Ellesse, Nike and Ralph Lauren were found.

Mr Allen added: "This was quite a small seizure of counterfeit clothing compared with some operations we have carried out recently.

"However, the find of the 10,000 labels does show us the scale of the action we could have expected in the future."

Mr Allen said: "This will not affect Blackburn's ability to turn out counterfeit goods as someone else will take this job up."

"The quality of counterfeit clothing is significantly poorer than the real thing."

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