The initiative was part of the wider Operation Impact, which saw police officers from South Yorkshire join forces with colleagues from other police forces across Yorkshire and the Humber region, as well as the Regional Roads Policing Team.

Over a two-month period, which comes to an end today, the team have used region-wide resources to tackle issues that affect people on a local level.

Issues addressed include neighbourhood policing in West Yorkshire and misuse of drugs in Humberside, culminating in the Roads Policing fortnight in South Yorkshire with two days of action on Monday and Tuesday this week.

Over the course of these two days, police stopped 169 vehicles out of nearly 50,000 whose number plates were read using Automatic Number Plate Recognition technology. The number plates were then cross-referenced with the police intelligence database and vehicles were stopped if they had previously been involved in illegal activity or if the registered owner was wanted by the police.

Of those stopped, police made 11 arrests. These included one person in Rotherham who was wanted by another force for a serious assault and one arrest for cultivation of cannabis, the information about which was linked to the person's vehicle.

Inquiries are also continuing after one incident in Barnsley, where one driver who was pursued is suspected of having thrown £3,000 in cash into a garden before police could search the vehicle.

Police also stopped and seized several vehicles with no insurance and arrested one disqualified driver.

Supt Richard Tweed from South Yorkshire Police, who headed the operation, said: "These results are pleasing as they show that only a small number of people stopped were found to have actually been committing offences.

"This hopefully is a reflection on the current situation in South Yorkshire and also how the strong police presence has been effective in deterring criminals.

"We will be continuing to target this type of criminality on a daily basis, in particular those issues that matter most to local residents."