TRADING Standards officers will continue to enforce the ban of an unsafe toy which they fear could still be on sale in Bolton.

Yo-Balls were banned by the Department of Trade and Industry on Thursday after a spate of incidents and tests on the elasticated toy showed that it posed a strangulation risk. The ruling means that traders will have to withdraw the item from sale or face prosecution.

The toy has been removed from the shelves of major toy retailers but Trading Standards officers in Bolton have warned it could still be available from street traders and market stalls in the town centre. A number of vendors in the market were advised yesterday that Yo-Balls must be removed from sale and officers will continue the crackdown until the are sure all units have been returned to suppliers. Darrell Walsh, principal trading standards officer, said: "The ban takes immediate effect and we have issued a statement to warn traders to return the toy to their suppliers.

"This is something that has been bubbling away for a while now and most of the main retailers took the toy off sale a week or so ago -- but we are concerned that market and street traders may still be selling them.

"We had officers on patrol yesterday and we will continue until there are no more left but the ban only came into force yesterday so we can expect to find them on sale in some places."

Mr Walsh urged parents to return any Yo-Balls to the store it was bought from and seek a refund. The toys, which consists of a liquid-filled ball on the end of a piece of elastic, were found to be in breach of the 1995 Toys (Safety) Regulation in tests commissioned by the government in response to eight reported incidents in the last month. It is the first such ban for over a decade.