A MOBILE phone marking scheme aimed at reducing thefts is to be re-launched in Burnley in the run-up to Christmas.

When the week-long initiative was run by police in Burnley town centre early this year 800 people took up the offer and one person even travelled from Accrington specifically to get his phone marked with a secret identity code.

The scheme was later repeated and extended throughout the Pennine police division, which includes all of Burnley, Pendle and Rossendale.

Now it is to be reintroduced in Burnley following the publication of a Home Office leaflet "Protect Your Phone".

The leaflets will be distributed and mobile phone owners given the opportunity to have their phones marked with their postcodes which makes thefts less likely and easier for recovered phones to be returned to their owner.

Inspector John Clucas said: "We still have occasional problems with schoolchildren where someone borrows another's phone and doesn't return it. This is a means of preventing that type of offence occurring."

There are also a small number of cases where phones are snatched from the owner's hand.

Insp Clucas added: "We are going to relaunch the scheme in Burnley in the couple of weeks or so and continue it over Christmas and into the new year.

"No doubt many people will be getting phones for Christmas and this will be a chance for them to have them marked."