RANDOM checks are being made on one in five repair jobs carried out by a council's maintenance department following claims of overcharging.

The allegations were made by former Butlin's accountant Stephen Birtwell, chairman of Haslingden Estates Management Board, who claimed overcharging by Rossendale Council Direct Labour Organisation was "continuous."

Mr Birtwell investigated nearly 2,000 repair jobs in Haslingden and claimed 250 were falsely recorded and 526 reports had been altered to give the impression the workforce was 11 per cent more efficient that it really was.

Discrepancies first came to light when it was discovered a DLO employee was falsifying computer records to give the impression that jobs which were over-running had been completed on time.

Since Mr Birtwell's allegations repair work over a 16-week period has also been checked in other parts of the borough. But council leader John McManus told the council so few problems were revealed that the DLO could be proud of itself.

He said: "In hundreds of jobs there were one or two examples of people writing the wrong date or getting the month wrong."

But he assured councillors new, tighter monitoring systems were now in place and another report would come to the next meeting of the housing committee.

Housing chairman Dick Stuart pledged that the council would be "open and honest" and said he did not want to see a Them and Us situation developing between the council and the estate management boards set up nine years ago by the ruling Labour group to make local government more community based.

Coun Stuart said the whole principles of estate management boards would be looked at.

Conservative leader John Holt added: "One of the things highlighted by this sorry saga is that there are differences of opinions on the various management agreements.

"There would seem to be some merit in a meeting between representatives of the EMBs and the housing committee."

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