PENSIONERS in Bolton are to be offered a new shopping delivery service after councillors agreed to a link up with the Somerfield supermarket chain.

Bolton Council contracted home care workers currently buy food from a variety of shops for around 400 elderly people in the borough.

But around 40 pensioners, together with new users of the service, will test the scheme from next month.

It could save the council £180,000 each year on the current £240,000 cost of contracting care workers.

Somerfield staff will collect orders, then pick up the food from a branch in Ashton-in-Makerfield near Wigan. They will then deliver it and put it away. There will also be a telephone helpline.

The service will cost pensioners £5, although the charge will be waived for orders over £25. They currently pay up to £20 a week depending on a financial assessment.

A council report says the saving will allow the department - which was forced to cut £3.3 million from its budget for next year - to meet "more critical and substantial needs".

Cllr Margaret Clare, the council's executive member for adult social care and health, said: "I think this partnership with Somerfield will be very useful.

"The money we spend on the current scheme could be used in more productive ways.

"This will give people more choice of what they can eat and we might end up with healthier pensioners. Although some have relatives or neighbours who do the shopping for them, others who are quite frail, sadly manage on a jam butty."

A spokesman for Somerfield said: "Schemes are now running successfully at four councils that employ care workers, helping more than 1,000 elderly customers."