PRICEY drinks and expensive food. Those were the two main gripes from motorists at Rownhams Roadchef on the M27 this morning as Britain's motorway service stations were officially declared Europe's worst in a report out today.

Overpriced food and poor hygiene standards were the main complaints in the

survey carried out by a European Consortium of Motoring Organisations.

Of ten countries polled, those in Britain finished bottom in terms of overall quality, barely improving upon their performances from studies in 2000 and 2001.

The inspectors said in their report: "The UK had the highest percentage of bad results. You could stop for petrol and perhaps buy some provisions but we wouldn't recommend taking a break there."

The price of a standard meal at the eight British service stations surveyed was found to be twice what it cost in Italy and Germany.

And general hygiene was found to be poor in four of the eight service stations with Sandbach South on the M6 in Cheshire named Europe's worst services.

It was the only one of 62 tested that was rated very poor. No sites in Europe were found to be very good with the inspectors only grading ten as good.

They found 38 of them acceptable and described 13 as poor. The only redeeming feature for the UK's establishments were their family-friendliness, range of goods in their shops and the friendliness of staff.

Bert Morris, deputy director of the AA Motoring Trust, described the results as "disappointing".

"Some motorway service areas are poor value for money, poorly managed and poorly maintained.

"They give people what they have come to expect, and that is, all too often, a poor standard."

Roadchef were unavailable for comment.