THE frustrated and frightened mother of a "problem" youth refused to collect him from a hospital stay so that Lancashire Social Services would be forced to listen to her plight.

Lynn Dickinson asked for "emergency" help with her 14-year-old son on August 20 when his name was placed on the list for a place at the Poulton-le-Fylde Community School.

But after almost a month of in-action, Mrs Dickinson seized the opportunity to force social workers' hands by refusing to collect Craig from Blackburn's Queen's Park Hospital where he had been admitted after eating fungi from the garden.

Mrs Dickinson said she has been torn between a mother's love and the fear that the boy, who claims to hear voices and sniffs gas, will attack his 10-year-old sister. She said: "I fear that I will wake up with a knife in my stomach. Naturally I love him and I wanted to go up to the hospital and collect him. But I didn't because I realised that was the only way I would gain help."

The boy was admitted to Queen's Park at the weekend and spent a further day there on Tuesday when his mum refused to collect him and contacted the Lancashire Evening Telegraph for help.

Mrs Dickinson eventually allowed him back to their Blackburn home after receiving assurances from social services that her case would be treated urgently.

She added: "I realise that the reason I have not been helped is purely financial. I had to act in the way I did and it seems that it might have helped.

"I have been dealing with him for a long time and placed him in voluntary care when he was four for about five weeks because I could not cope.

"I want help for him but they are not doing anything." The son has sporadically refused to go to school for the last three months and frequents the red light district.

The Poulton-le-Fylde Community School is a voluntary care school operated by experts.

However, it is the only school of its kind serving East Lancashire. Many social workers privately feel more places should be available.

Lancashire Social Services said they did not comment on individual cases.

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