UNDER-AGE drinking blights neighbourhoods right across East Lancashire.

Most of the county's residents will have encountered problems with youths drinking and causing a nuisance at some point.

In some areas the problems are worse than others and residents' lives are made a misery by alcohol-fuelled anti-social behaviour night after night.

That is why tougher measures to tackle the problem are to be welcomed.

The new proposals will see parents who allow their children to drink being made subject to parenting orders - or even being prosecuted. Off-licences and bars will also only be given one opportunity to improve if they are caught selling booze to youngsters.

If they do it a second time they will end up being fined or in court.

Hopefully these measures will help to tackle what is a major problem.

Police and the council need the tools at their disposal to deal successfully with youngsters and adults who persistently flout the law.

But tough laws and robust policing need to go hand in hand with providing other things for young people to do to stop them drinking on the streets.

Only then will the problem finally be solved.