A BLACKBURN man has been arrested by police investigating a major counterfeit cash gang that could have produced more than £1million.

Police suspect that the 45-year-old, from the Little Harwood area, was the coinmaker for the group.

He is alleged to have made £1 and £2 coins by melting metal on his cooker. As part of a major nationwide swoop, Lancashire officers arrested him at a motorway service station in Manchester where they seized what they allege to be 6,000 fake £1 coins and £5,000 in counterfeit £20 notes.

Following a year-long investigation, four other people were arrested in Yorkshire, Humberside and Norfolk.

So far police said they had recovered £100,000 in fake money, and it is claimed the total could pass £1million.

A Lancashire police spokesman said it was believed there had been a “significant operation” running across the UK.

Following the arrest houses were searched in Blackburn, Accrington and Rochdale.

Officers believe the man made the coins while others printed £20 and 50euro notes.

In the Rochdale house police said a “production plant” was found, and officers believe metal was melted on the cooker which was put into moulds.

An electro-plating technique would then be used to colour the silver coins, which were used across the North West, according to police.

The investigation was launched after Bank of England experts noted a sudden increase in £1 and £2 coins, as well as £20 and 50euro notes.

Five police forces, as well as the Serious Organised Crime Agency (SOCA), have been investigating the “wholesale production and national supply of counterfeit currency”, the spokesman said, with Lancashire specialists drafted in to investigate the Blackburn man.

He was arrested on Thursday at on suspicion of production and supply of counterfeit currency at Birch Services on the M62 near Manchester, where the fake cash was found in his vehicle, and taken to Burnley Police for questioning.

Yesterday he was transferred to Sheffield, because the operation is being led by South Yorkshire Police.

A Lancashire Police spokesman said: “The arrest follows a nationally-coordinated investigation involving South Yorkshire Police, Lancashire Constabulary, Humberside, Norfolk, West Yorkshire Police and SOCA into the wholesale production and national supply of counterfeit currency.”