RESIDENTS in the Milnshaw area of Accrington could be the first to benefit from a new scheme to outlaw cold calling.

But community leaders said the initiative, which aims to protect residents from bogus callers and rogue traders, will only work if local people get behind it.

Accrington has been identified as a priority area for the idea due to the number of elderly and vulnerable people living in the town.

The Milnshaw area, which is bounded by Queen's Road West, Pansy Street, Lancaster Avenue and Gloucester Avenue, and includes around 340 homes, was chosen as the first zone because of the high proportion housing for older people.

Also, according to crime statistics for 2005, more than 80per cent of burglaries in this area were committed against older people, and half of these involved some form of bogus calling or distraction.

At a meeting of Lancashire Local in Accrington, Mike Ormerod, from Lancashire County Council, which is leading the initiative through its trading standards office, said that according to the police, for every distraction burglary reported there are eight or nine that are not.

Funding for the scheme has come from Lancashire County Council's Local Innovation Fund.

If it is successful it could be rolled out to other areas in Hyndburn, with Clayton-le-Moors identified as the next possible location.