A COUNCIL leader is launching a triple charity challenge to support several of his town hall colleagues who are battling cancer.

Coun Charlie Briggs will be taking part in the Jane Tomlinson 10k run in Blackburn, a race backed by the Lancashire Telegraph, on July 11.

Not content with that feat, he is also planning a sponsored parachute jump and a charity bike ride in the coming weeks.

The 54-year-old has been motivated in part by the death of his colleague and friend Bill Bennett, who represented the Queensgate ward and was a county councillor before his death earlier this year.

Former mayor Coun John Harbour has also been undergoing a much-publicised battle with throat cancer.

And his replacement Coun Tony Lambert has struggled with ill health over the past few months after being diagnosed. He has named the haematology and chemotherapy unit at Burnley General Hospital as one of his civic charities.

Coun Briggs’ running mate Coun Frank Ashworth and Labour’s Coun Howard Baker are also undergoing their own personal battles with the disease.

He will split his fundraising efforts between Pendleside Hospice and the armed forces fundraisers, Help for Heroes.

Coun Briggs said: “There have been so many councillors who have been fighting cancer and my mum died from it as well. But I also wanted to help out the soldier’s charity as welI. I’m in training and I’ve lost a lot of weight.”

The father-of-three, married to Rosegrove with Lowerhouse councillor Lynne Briggs, has already staged a charity coffee morning at Burnley Town Hall which raised £300.

He is in the process of setting up a charity website page, so people in the borough can donate to his mission.