THE nominations for the Lancashire County Council election on May 1 have closed - with 24 candidates doing battle against each other in the six Chorley divisions.

They comprise six Labour, six Conservative, six Liberal Democrat and six Natural Law candidates.

This is how they line up:

CHORLEY EAST:

PM Haughton (Conservative); PDN Leadbetter (Natural Law); D Porter (Liberal Democrat); D Yates (Labour).

D Yates won the seat for Labour in 1993 with a 1,315 majority.

CHORLEY NORTH:

J Ayliffe (Natural Law); PJ Collinson (Conservative); VJ Murphy (Labour); L Norman (Liberal Democrat).

VJ Murphy won the seat for Labour in 1993 with a 209 majority.

CHORLEY RURAL EAST:

M Porter (Liberal Democrat); MP Case (Conservative); AS Holgate (Labour); PMR Mead (Natural Law).

MP Case won the seat for the Conservatives in 1993 with a 72 majority.

CHORLEY RURAL NORTH:

ME Livesey (Conservative); JE Cronshaw (Labour); L Jensen (Natural Law); MP Lavender (Liberal Democrat).

ME Livesey won the seat for the Conservatives in 1993 with an 845 majority.

CHORLEY RURAL WEST:

JK Charnley (Conservative); A Whittaker (Labour); A Bland (Liberal Democrat); BA Collins (Natural Law).

JK Charnley won the seat for the Conservatives in 1993 with a 583 majority.

CHORLEY WEST:

JR Toon (Labour); KW Ball (Liberal Democrat); P Malpas (Conservative); GS Mead (Natural Law).

JR Toon won the seat for Labour in 1993 with a 1,817 majority.

A total of 257 candidates have been declared for the 78 electoral divisions in the 12 districts throughout Lancashire.

Labour and the Conservatives each have a total of 78 candidates fighting the seats, the Liberal Democrats 53, Natural Law 32, Greens 10, Independents four and others two.

Because of the General Election on the same day, the count for the county council election will take place on May 2, with the first results expected to come in at 10am.

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