AN MP has called for a review of the law after a convicted paedophile was allowed to leave the UK and get a job working with children.

Alan Smith, 53, formerly of Carter Street, Accrington, was jailed for abusing a 14-year-old girl in August 2005 - but now works at a school near Bangkok, Thailand.

Smith is on the UK sex offenders' register but there is no law to stop a person on the register from moving abroad.

Hyndburn MP Greg Pope said the situation showed that tighter controls were needed to monitor sex offenders, especially as Thai authorities appeared not to act on British concerns about Smith.

Lancashire police were monitoring Smith and he told them last November that he wished to move to Thailand to find a bride - and they informed the national Child Exploitation and Online Protection centre.

A spokesman for CEOP said Thai authorities were told "several times" Smith was a convicted paedophile but nothing was done.

Mr Pope said that the question needed to be asked about whether Smith's passport should have been confiscated.

He said: "Tackling sex offenders is a very high priority for British police but I don't know how high a priority it is in Thailand.

"Any reasonable person would be concerned he has been able to avoid the attentions of authorities simply by moving abroad.

"There is one aspect we could look at and that is whether we can confiscate the passport of known sex offenders, particularly to stop travel outside the European Union."

Smith, who acted as Accrington Stanley's mascot Stan the Monkey before his conviction, has now been spotted teaching English at the Nongyai temple school set in the grounds of a Buddhist monastery 20 miles north of the Thai capital. He pleaded guilty to indecency with a child after an incident in the kitchen of a pub where he worked in 2005.

Sentencing him, Judge Anthony Russell said he should be "thoroughly ashamed" after pulling the girl's knickers from her trousers and touching her on her back.

He was due to stand trial for a number of sex offences but proceedings were halted when he pleaded guilty to the offence.

Smith was ordered to be put on the sex offenders' register for seven years.

The Royal Thai Police are now investigating the sighting of Smith.

Police Colonel Jarut Surattuyaporn said: "British police can confirm this man's conviction and we can arrest him, deport him and blacklist him from coming to Thailand again."

Det Insp Jim Elston of Lancashire Police said: "He was not obliged to inform the police about when he intended to return to the UK but intimated that this would be in April 2007.

"When he did not return, Lancashire police officers alerted the appropriate agencies, including Inter-pol, in line with agreed national protocols.

"Mr Smith has not breached the requirements of the sex offenders register in the UK."

A spokesman for CEOP said: "Both Lancashire police and the Child Exploitation and Online Protection Centre passed reports to law enforcement colleagues in Thailand on several occasions alerting them to the presence of the individual.

Sudarat Sereewat, of the Thai organisation Fight Against Child Exploitation, said: "This is a disturbing case.

"Everybody needs to work together to ensure this does not happen again."