THE Government is under pressure to reverse a decision which will see a specialist team targeting illegal loan sharks broken up and moved out of the region.

Twenty five North-East Labour MPs have collectively written to Consumer Minister Edward Davey to express "grave concerns" about the future of the North East Illegal Money Lending Team (IMLT) and the transfer of its work to a national team based in Birmingham.

The Government believes the move will bring efficiency savings and even better results.

The North-East IMLT , which employs eight people and is based in Middlesbrough, has helped convict 40 loan sharks and helped write-off illegal debts worth £2m since its launch in December 2007.

But there have been doubts about whether that is enough of a return for an operation whose annual running costs are understood to have amounted to more than £1.3m to date.

The MPs said that the North-East was a "hot spot" for illegal loan sharking due to the very high levels of poverty and deprivation in the region, while there were also recorded cases of women being forced into prosecution because of loan sharks.

They also said that small scale estate-based money lending was "culturally embedded" in the region and had a considerable impact on the most vulnerable.

To move to a nationally based team would lead to a massive reduction in the service currently offered to 12 local authorities in the North-East and see strong links with Trading Standards and the police lost.

The MPs said it was expected that the majority, if not all, of the local lenders the North-East IMLT had taken action against would not be targets for a national team which prioritised resources against larger lenders.

The letter said: "In a time when it is expected that the North-East will lose thousands of public sector jobs it appears somewhat bizarre to make the team redundant, handing its work to a national team who will "parachute" workers, based in Birmingham, back into the area to tackle the work the team have been doing on a local basis."

The Government has now been asked to consider options which would reduce the North East IMLT's current budget, but still maintain its presence in the region, the MPs added.