LAP dancing clubs have taken erotic performance out of the seedy back streets and into the realms of respectable entertainment. But why has the craze now booming across the UK always bombed in East Lancashire? Chief reporter DAVID HIGGERSON investigates.

PRUDISHNESS is not an overly common trait in the Lancastrian personality.

Indeed, calls this week for extra measures to combat dogging -- the practice of couples meeting strangers for outdoor sex -- is proof that, if anything, people are more liberal-minded than most.

But why then have the only two ventures into the world of lap dancing both failed?

Bailiffs were to repossess Blackburn's only club, The Velvet Lounge, today, bringing an end businesswoman Georgia Elliott's dream of creating the area's version of the famous Spearmint Rhino club.

The venue struggled from the start, with the concerns of churchmen matched only by the murmurings of those who feared its location in Duke Street was too far off the beaten track worn by town centre revellers to make an impact.

Even a court victory over Blackburn with Darwen Council, which allowed dancers to take off their G-strings on stage and dance fully nude, failed to save the doomed club.

An East Lancashire businessman who has run lap-dancing bars in towns and cities said there simply wasn't a market for it in Blackburn.

"You need a strong business presence in the town. A lot of business for a lap dancing bar comes from businessmen taking clients out or groups of executives letting their hair down at the end of the week.

"The money isn't actually made from the dancing, most of that goes to the girls, the venue makes its money from the bar. The Velvet Lounge charged up to three pounds for a bottle of beer, as all venues do.

"In Blackburn, there is a large Asian population and while the young lads might go for a lap dance, they don't drink. Coupled with the lack of executives and the fact it was so out of the way, I think it was always on a hiding to nothing."

East Lancashire is one of few areas in the country with growing church attendances, with the clergy among the most ardent opponents to the opening of The Velvet Lounge, prompting Miss Elliott's legal representative to point out that if people objected, they didn't need to go.

But those words seemed to have come back to haunt the venue, while the suggestion its demise was a damning indication of Blackburn's failure to attract economic growth has been laughed off by leader of the council, Kate Hollern.

"There is more investment coming into the borough than at any other time. Jobs on all levels are being created.

"The new courts buildings should bring in a lot of legal jobs, and the number of white-collar jobs is increasing," said Coun Hollern.

"To suggest we can't support a lap dancing club because we don't have the right people here is nonsense. It is probably just because people didn't want to go week in, week out."

Nudity has been used as a draw by businesses before, with pubs boss Margo Grimshaw famous for having topless barmaids 30 years ago.

But few have lasted -- with Afterlife, a pole dancing club in the former Aenon Baptist Chapel, Red Lion Street, Burnley, forced to close down last December after just a month.

Mike Igoe, chairman of the Burnley License Victuallers' Association, said he was surprised the clubs had bombed.

He said: "You'd have thought Afterlife would have been successful, especially as it was the only such venue in town, but it didn't.

"It was like when they tried topless barmaids, it was not popular.

"The only thing I could suggest to why they didn't work was the prices were too high."

But Evening Telegraph columnist Margo said she has refined her views in recent years.

"Sex is a private thing and I don't think people around here want to flaunt it or talk about it.

"Those who do tend to do it the least," she added.