ROSSENDALE council has announced ambitious plans to transform itself from the worst council in the country into one of the best within the next five years.

Council leaders are urging Rossendale people to complete, and return, a questionnaire that will help turn around the council's fortunes.

About 2,200 questionnaires asking people how they rate Rossendale Council services were posted to homes last month, and 810 have been returned so far.

Audit Commission researchers need 1,100 responses by the November 28 deadline in order to compare Rossendale Council services with others nationwide.

Rossendale was named as the worst performing authority in the country in last year's Audit Commission report.

But since the report, commissioners found Rossendale had responded positively and, through its corporate recovery plan, described the council as demonstrating a desire to make a new start.

Coun Graham Pearson, Rossendale Council leader, said: "We need to know how we are performing in order that we can improve -- and we can't look at it just from a Valley perspective as other councils are improving as quickly as we are.

"What is important to us is that we get our services to being among the best in the country by 2008.

"Similar questionnaires are being sent out by local authorities across the country and the results will allow direct comparisons to be made.

"Our vision seeks to ensure that eight in 10 of our customers are satisfied with services by 2008."

The user satisfaction questionnaires, posted last month to randomly selected homes, cover areas such as waste collection, handling of complaints, quality of life issues and recycling.