WILTSHIRE County Council has been branded an ostrich that has its head stuck in the sand, in an official report of a discussion group with dissatisfied residents in Chippenham and Devizes.

The research was carried out to explore the reasons behind levels of dissatisfaction with the county council among residents.

Last November, 14 per cent of Wiltshire residents said they were unhappy with the county council.

Wiltshire is near the bottom of the pile in the popularity stakes according to the Audit Commission, ranking 31st out of 34 for popularity.

Focus groups were set up to help find out why.

Members were part of the People's Voice consultation group, comprising more than 5,000 residents who regularly give their views on the county council by post.

They explored a number of areas, including services, the image of the county council, value for money and low levels of accessibility.

The group took part in word games, picking out words from a list of 20 that reflected their view of the county council. Remote, bureaucratic and impersonal were the most popular choices.

The second part of the exercise was another word game, with a list of animals and group members were asked to pick out the one that most represented the county council.

Ostrich, elephant and fox were picked out and others were added to the list including rat.

Focus group members said they were unhappy with the state of the roads and pavements, the inaccessible language used in county council literature, and the poor response to telephone inquiries.

Some members believed the county council was guilty of moral blackmail threatening cuts in education and Social Services if taxes did not increase.

"Threatening to turn off street lights in rural areas was seen as a crude attempt to frighten people into accepting a higher level of council tax," the report says.

County council leader Peter Chalke denied the report had been kept secret.

"We have very many surveys, they are part of a programme," he said.

He admitted many people were unhappy with the state of the roads but added general satisfaction rates expressed in the People's Voice surveys were quite high. He said the county council had noted concerns about dealing with phone enquiries and taken steps to improve the situation. He denied the charge of moral blackmail.

"If the Government does not fund our basic levels of service, then we have to make the council tax higher," he said.