REWARDS of £500 are being offered to anyone who turns in a speed camera vandal in West Yorkshire.

The cash is being put up by the West Yorkshire Casualty Reduction Partnership, the organisation responsible for the cameras.

Officials say such vandalism is not a major issue but the move aims to deter would-be attackers.

Some cameras in the county have been set alight and others attacked with mechanical cutting devices.

Philip Gwynne, the partnership spokesman, said: “It’s not a big or growing issue in West Yorkshire and we aim to keep it that way.”

Mr Gwynne said some cameras had been attacked by “ineffectual drive-by arson attempts’’ but these had only scorched the cameras’ casing.

“Occasionally there are more serious efforts. One camera head was cut down using an angle grinder and another was torched.”

Chief Insp Christopher Moorhouse-Everett, of West Yorkshire Police, said the attacks were “not just a bit of vandalism, but a serious offence of criminal damage which can have dangerous repercussions for the road and community alongside it.”