COMMUNITY relationships - not equality of numbers - should be the over-riding factor when constituency boundaries were drawn up, Lowick residents told the Boundary Commission meeting in Carlisle.

Representatives of Lowick Parish Council were objecting to a proposal by the Commission to include the whole of the Crake Valley ward in the Barrow and Furness constituency.

They presented a petition of 142 names in favour of Crake Valley remaining in the Westmorland and Lonsdale constituency.

The Commission also received a petition of 125 names from Egton-with-Newland Parish Council.

"We appreciate the desirability of trying to equalise constituency numbers," said the Crake Valley representative on South Lakeland District Council, Coun Noel Spendlove, "but more important is the need to respect community relationships, and to get the best national representation that can be achieved."

Lowick Parish Council chairman Tommy Clegg told Assistant Commissioner Susan Matthews QC that they had no affinity with Barrow whatsoever.

Parish councillor Liz Vaughan said that a survey in the Lowick area had revealed that nearly all residents wanted to stay within the Westmorland and Lonsdale constituency.

But representative for Low Furness Coun Jim Webster argued in favour of Crake Valley joining the Barrow and Furness constituency.

There were both historical and modern links to the Furness area he said and transport, education, health and the tourist industry all linked in to make it a natural alliance.

Support for Crake Valley staying within Westmorland came from South Lakeland District Council.

Director of Administration Jim Morrison said that after originally supporting the proposed move to Barrow, the council had now decided to support local public opinion in the parishes of Lowick and Egton-with-Newland, whose residents felt they had "absolutely nothing in common with the predominantly urban and industrial Barrow and Furness constituency..