MORE than 1,000 areas of land in Pendle could be contaminated with potentially hazardous substances.

Now Pendle Council is to spend over £600,000 investigating whether sites are dangerous and if so what is needed to make them safe.

Council bosses have reviewed the borough's land and identified about 1,035 sites which have to be looked at in more detail.

The private owners of any contaminated sites will be contacted by the authority and asked to clean them.

The council could prosecute anybody who refuses and recover the costs of the work.

Council-owned land would be made safe by the authority.

Speaking at a meeting of Pendle Council's executive, Councillor John David, executive member for the environment, said the list of sites had not been made public.

He said: "Once we have evaluated whether they are contaminated, we need to proceed legally.

"If it is private land the owners will be talked to and hopefully voluntary remediation work can take place. "If they do it voluntarily they are certain tax rewards but if they do not we have to the power to take enforcement action."

The council started the review in July and identified 935 at-risk sites.

Since then about a another 100 pieces of land have been identified.

The borough's historic industries of cotton and weaving; textiles; quarrying; coal mining; making leathers; wallpaper manufacturing and gas works could have contributed to possible contamination, according to the council.

Lesley Miller, the council's public health manager for pollution, said it was not yet known how much it would cost make affected areas safe.

She added: "In the event contaminated land was found on council owned land and remediation necessary, there is some funding available from Defra (Department for Environment Food and Rural Affairs).