The Lancashire town of Wigan declared victory yesterday in its battle with neighbours such as Preston to claim the "genuine" home of the cartoon characters Wallace and Gromit.

Speculation over a glimpse of a Wigan A-Z streetguide in the movie, The Curse of the Were-Rabbit, has been followed by a council monitoring exercise which has established that 62 West Wallaby Street, home of Wallace and Gromit, is a Wigan address.

Wigan's head of tourism, Keith Bergman, said: "It's another claim to fame for the town, to go with George Orwell and our success in the Premiership."