A police squad leading Sussex's war against drugs has been disbanded and its officers put back on the beat.

The highly-trained street crime unit, praised for its efforts in tackling dealers over the past three years, has been replaced by a team of rank-and-file PCs.

Worried officers contacted us to express their concern at the move.

Latest figures put Brighton and Hove's drug problem on a similar level to major metropolitan centres and inner-city London.

Police chiefs say members of the five-strong team, who worked in plain clothes to gather intelligence before striking at individual targets, are now back in uniform working as local support teams (LSTs) on high-visibility operations.

An insider said ex-members were frustrated by the move citing the high number of arrests they had made.

But police chiefs said disbanding the unit was in response to public calls to have more police on the beat.

Chief Superintendent Paul Curtis, divisional commander for Brighton and Hove, said the officers' skills could be used more effectively in the local squads where they were being trained to deal with other types of crime.

He said: "This change fits in with Sussex Police's number one priority, which is to have more police on patrol and visible in the city.

"That is what the public has been asking for and that is what we want. We are trying to tackle the drug problem at a higher level."

Mr Curtis said research showed people were more worried about car crime and their houses being burgled than crack and heroin dealers.

But he said the strategic reshuffle was also aimed at preventing drug problems from spiralling out of control in the next five years.

He said: "The energy and enthusiasm of the street crime unit at tackling drugs at street level was excellent but while that may have taken someone off the street for a day, it wasn't dealing with the suppliers."

He said the LSTs were trained to deal with a range of crimes, including drugs, car crime, burglaries, searches and interviewing.

He said: "For example, when Summer went missing on Monday night, we deployed an LST who could deal with the whole situation rather than having to get different officers specialising in different areas.

"The LSTs are a pro-active element that are three times more effective than the street crime unit with three times the numbers and who are trained to look at the bigger picture."

Research carried out by Imperial College London earlier this year revealed there were at least 2,300 injecting adult drug users in Brighton and Hove.

The resort was also named the drugs death capital of Europe in a report by the European Centre for Addiction Studies.