CRIMINALS are losing millions of pounds in cash and assets in a major police clampdown - which the villains themselves are funding.

In the ultimate irony, seized money and goods are being used to finance the region-wide campaign to take the profit out of crime.

With the campaign's momentum gathering, detectives are confident that seizures and confiscations will rise even further.

And today representatives from seven different police forces, together with experts from HM Revenue and Customs, the National Criminal Intelligence Service and other agencies met in Harrogate to discuss and share tactics.

The North-East Regional Asset Recovery Team was formed in January last year and operates from bases in Durham and Leeds.

In the months since then it has confiscated £1.8m in cash from criminals and, from 135 people under investigation, has identified £20m in assets of which £15m has been frozen.

In addition 22 arrests have been made and £1.3m in cash has been intercepted and seized.

The assets seized all go to the Treasury - and from there are channelled back into the campaign, code-named Operation Payback.

The intelligence-led initiative is designed to ensure that criminals are not allowed to benefit from their ill-gotten gains - in turn leading to overall crime reduction.

It builds on the 2002 Proceeds of Crime Act, which gave the police extra powers to tackle money-laundering and seize, confiscate and freeze assets.

"It is a very powerful piece of legislation and it is making a huge difference to crime-fighting," said the man leading the team, Detective Chief Inspector Peter Ramsay.

"We are attacking the cash that funds criminal activity and criminals lifestyles."

Under the slogan "Who's in the cash but not in a job" the team are now urging public to tip them off about people in their areas.

"We want to encourage them to work with us through Crimestoppers to feed us that essential community intelligence. We will act on it," said Det Ch Insp Ramsay.

"It is already starting to happen. It is working and we are going to carry on building on it. This is not a brief campaign - it is a permanent, long-term action."