PENSIONERS are being forced to stay in hospital because social services are not ready to take them home, it was revealed today.

Patients at Burnley General took the equivalent of one bed for almost half a year because council chiefs couldn't organise to take them home earlier.

This meant NHS bosses slapped Lancashire County Council's social services department with a £17,200 fine £100 a day.

Blackburn with Darwen Council, meanwhile, was not fined a penny.

Not a single patient at Blackburn's hospitals has had to stay an extra day in hospital because of failings by social services in the last three years, figures show.

Social services are asked by hospitals to take on the care of some elderly patients and ensure they are properly cared for on release.

County council bosses today refused to reveal what caused the delays.

But critics said the county council had to "get its act together" especially as 20 per cent of the hospital's overnight beds are to be axed in the coming year to save cash.

Hospital chiefs have said the amount of time people spent in hospital must fall to make this work with one day coming off each patient's stay.

Mollie Manthorpe, chairman of the Patient and Public Involvement Forum which oversees East Lancashire Hospitals NHS Trust, said: "When they are talking about decreasing the time spent in hospital then the council have really got to get their act together.

"If patients can't get the help they need then they are the main losers."

Bosses are to take 211 beds out of East Lancashire's hospitals by next April to save £2.5million on staffing costs.

Of these, 110 are at Burnley, which has about 640 beds.

A county council spokeswoman said: "We take this issue seriously and have processes in place with both hospitals to ensure people are not unnecessarily delayed in leaving hospital.

"We are continuing to work with Burnley General Hospital to address and resolve this problem, and in the past year have almost halved the delayed discharge costs we have incurred."

Linda Whitfield, head of patient experience from the medical division at the hospitals trust, said: "We recognise that there is further work to do with our social services partners and primary care to make sure all our systems work as efficiently as possible for patients."

A fines system was introduced in April 2003 and for the next 12 months the county council was penalised just £200 equivalent to two bed days.

Yet the following year this had rocketed 5,400 per cent to £10,800.

The most recent figure, for 2005/06, was £6,200. The major increase over the first two years was because the system was "bedding in" Mrs Whitfield said and staff were "getting used to identifying and recording patients whose discharge was being delayed against the new criteria."

In March, the Evening Telegraph revealed a survey of patients at Burnley General found more than a third of people well enough to go home.

About 20 per cent of these were waiting for social services while the majority, 65 per cent, were waiting to be assessed by a hospital doctor before leaving.