TOUGH new laws to combat metal thieves are expected to be announced by the Government.

Home Secretary Theresa May is thought to be set to announce a ban on scrap dealers accepting cash payments in a bid to combat a problem which police say has its epicentre in the North East.

Unlimited fines for people caught trading stolen scrap could also be unveiled, with both measures coming into force in April.

The metal recycling industry is worth around £5.6 billion and employs almost 8,000 people in the UK, recycling millions of tonnes of metal.

But a number of illegal sites and itinerant dealers are suspected of operating a business possibly as big as the legal trade.

Thefts have caused havoc on the railways, and seen churches and war memorials stripped of metal.

Now North MPs are piling on the pressure for legislative action, calling the scrap metal industry the weak link in combating crime.

Gateshead MP Ian Mearns said: “We are behind the cash ban but also the courts need to understand the problem is not the value of the scrap metal, but reinstating the job of what that scrap metal was doing before it was stolen.”

Thieves stealing cable from an electricity substation in Gateshead a few months ago affected dozens of households, said the Labour MP. He added: “It caused hundreds of thousands of pounds of damage to household electrics because of a power surge.”