SPANISH seoritas and a single seor are winging their way to Britain today for a two-year stint in Blackburn's hospitals.

And nursing bosses hope a real Lancashire welcome will encourage them to set up home here permanently.

The group of 12 nurses heading for Blackburn are part of the contingent of 63 arriving at Manchester airport from Madrid today to work in the North West.

NHS officials hope the pilot scheme in Blackburn, Preston, Morecambe and Blackpool will help take the pressure off British nurses, who are suffering due to a shortage of trained staff.

Director of nursing Richard Gildert, of Blackburn, Hyndburn and Ribble Valley NHS Trust, said Spain was one of the few countries with an over-supply of medical staff.

He said many of the nurses, who are in their twenties and thirties, had been qualified for several years but had been unable to find permanent positions.

Ten of the nurses will be working in general surgery wards, while the other two will be in general medicine.

They will all stay in flats belonging to the NHS Trust opposite the Infirmary, which have been stocked with food for their first few days in their new homes.

Assistant nursing director Marie Thompson and acute services manager Anne Asher, will be showing them round the area this weekend and will help them set up bank accounts on Monday.

A welcome dinner will be held for all 63 Spanish nurses at the Royal Preston Hospital on Monday, January 29.

Mr Gildert said: "We want to make them as welcome as possible because we want them to stay permanently."

For three months they will take part in courses run at the Infirmary by the University of Central Lancashire.

Mr Gildert said all the nurses could speak and write English but were going to have extra classes in conversational English and nursing practice.

Mr Gildert said: "Training for nurses is almost the same right across Europe, but we want them to understand our ways and our machines."

It is the first time the Trust has looked abroad to ease their staffing problems, partly caused by the creation of a new eight-bed high dependency unit, enlarged intensive care unit and more beds in other wards.

Many Blackburn nurses applied to work in the new wards, leaving a shortfall in other areas.