UNION bosses today blamed a lack of Government funding after Burnley Council announced a series of job cuts.

The authority, which is looking to save £1million from its budget, said it was looking to axe up to 20 jobs through voluntary early retirement and compulsory redundancies.

Public service union UNISON blamed the Government and said the amount of money given to the borough by the Treasury was not enough after it was revealed the Revenue Support Grant (RSG) did not rise between 1992 to 2002.

Burnley is thought to be the only local authority in England and Wales to suffer such a spending freeze.

Councillor Peter Kenyon, the council's executive member for best value and resources, said the job losses came after public consultation on cost cutting.

He said: "The council has always made it clear that it has to find savings in excess of £1 million and has carried out public consultation on that basis.

"We can only achieve this by employing fewer staff and in some cases redundancies are being actively looked at, but I would stress that in all cases there has been ongoing consultation with the unions since before Christmas.

"The final package will be a mixture of voluntary early retirement and some compulsory redundancies from a range of different services across the council, but the number of staff involved is likely to be less than 20 in total.

"We do not anticipate that the proposals that are currently being looked at will lead to major reductions in services, but once again we have been consulting with user groups in a number of areas."

The authority announced it had to claw back more than £1million to meet its budget requirements last year and issued questionnaires to residents and business leaders in a bid to find out where savings should be made.

It is anticipated that most of the cuts will be made within Burnley's leisure service -- including three part-time Town Hall tea-ladies, who have already been told their jobs are being scrapped.

According to UNISON the job losses will also include games attendants at Towneley Park, Thompson Park's summer-time boat attendants, one park ranger and possibly a park support worker.

The bar and cafe at the Thompson Centre in Red Lion Street will also be closed permanently with the loss of one full-time and four part-time jobs.

But the authority is hoping that the necessary cutbacks can be partly met by employees volunteering for early retirement.

Peter Thorne, branch secretary of UNISON, said: "We have been involved in the process from the start. We are not happy about the situation, but we have to accept it.

"We believe it is down to the lack of financial support from the Government. Although the Revenue Support Grant given to Burnley has increased this year, it has not risen enough.

"We feel we have been consulted properly and have been fully involved. We understand why they have got to do this."