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THE soaring price of fuel has prompted a surge in thefts of domestic heating oil from tanks outside homes and farms across the region.

North Yorkshire Police say there have already been 27 such thefts across the county so far this year, compared with only six in the same period last year.

A spokeswoman said the 27 included four thefts in the York area, five in Selby, seven in Hambleton, three in Ryedale and one in the Harrogate district.

The oil thefts follows a trend of thieves taking items containing metals such as lead, copper and even platinum, which have all been soaring in value.

Scores of churches and schools have had lead stolen from their roofs, copper wiring has been stolen from alongside railway tracks. Catalytic converters have been stolen from vehicles parked outside garages and homes for the platinum they contain.

Police and insurers say oil thefts have become a nationwide crimewave, with an increase in the number of incidents from Cornwall to the north of Scotland, and people are being urged to be on their guard and take extra precautions.

Brazen thieves have in some cases been rolling up to properties with tankers in the dead of night and siphoning hundreds of pounds worth of oil out of tanks.

About 1.5 million people are thought to use home heating oil in Britain, mainly in rural areas where there is no gas main available.

Domestic heating oil has risen in price from less than 40 pence a litre to more than 55 pence a litre in less than a year, and a tank can contain £1,000 worth of oil.

NFU Mutual said it had received more than 100 claims for oil theft in the past six months, including the theft of £300 worth of oil from a holiday cottage near Whitby.

Spokesman Tim Price said it was a new crime from NFU Mutual's perspective. "We had not seen domestic oil being taken until about six months ago. Thieves will steal anything that they realise is valuable; we have seen it with scrap iron. They see where the money is and then follow it."

The insurer is advising people to relocate or camouflage tanks which are currently visible from the road.

9:41am Friday 9th May 2008

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