AN anti-vice drive is to be taken to the doors of prostitutes.

Town leaders are to urge private landlords to take action against vice girls living in their rented flats and houses.

The move follows suspicions that prostitutes in Middlesbrough are avoiding traditional police target areas in order to ply their trade in the neighbourhoods where they live.

There is also evidence that they are growing in numbers.

Middlesbrough Borough Council is to make a direct appeal to its Private Landlords Forum to bar prostitutes from their property under future tenancy agreements, and to threaten women with eviction if they persist in soliciting in their neighbourhoods.

A council spokesman said: "We don't want to make the girls homeless because we will only land ourselves with a bigger problem. We have to do this in a sensitive way.

"I think the landlords will come on board. We may need some statutory backing.''

Middlesbrough council, which evicts council house tenants for anti-social behaviour, has already enlisted the help of private landlords in refusing to give drug dealers a home.

The council leader, Councillor Ken Walker, has said the council will name and shame unscrupulous landlords who continue to let known drug dealers operate from their houses.

Mosque leaders, who this week organised a street demonstration in protest at prostitution in the town, meet council representatives for discussions, on Tuesday.

A joint approach is to be made to Home Secretary Jack Straw for help, after placard and petition-waving residents took to the streets in protest at prostitutes working outside their homes.

The protest was organised by businessman Mehdi Mobeen, who said : "Next week, we will get together with Middlesbrough Borough Council, put our heads together to see what we can do within our respective powers, and send off the petitions to Jack Straw, with recommendations from the council and the police as to what should be done.