THOUSANDS of country folk from Oxfordshire joined yesterday's huge protest in London.

More than 70 coaches and two special trains left the county to take part in the Countryside Alliance march.

Police estimated more than 250,000 people took part in the peaceful demonstration against a range of issues, including a proposed ban on fox-hunting with dogs, building in the Green Belt, the beef crisis and the erosion of village services.

Sam Butler, of Filkins, Brize Norton, who helped organise the march, said: "I have never experienced anything like it. There is a lot of disquiet in the countryside. If there is a ban on hunting there will be further unrest and we shall see an even more forceful demonstration.

"I would like to see this resolved peacefully and by negotiation. As the UN General Secretary said, it is better to show force than to use it."

Farmers Angus and Josephine Irvine, of Nil Farm, Hook Norton, and their five children joined the march. Mrs Irvine said: "We are a very keen fox-hunting family. We feel we are being dictated to by a nanny state, by urban people who don't understand our way of life."

Conservative county councillor for Bicester South, Charles Shouler, said: "There were people as far as the eye could see. They had come to demonstrate their feelings to the Government. They have had enough."

Witney Tory MP Shaun Woodward said: "This is a real awakening of the consciousness of the nation." But Abingdon and Oxford West Lib Dem MP Dr Evan Harris, who joined protesters on the train to London, said it would be wrong to interpret the march as a criticism of the Government.

He said: "It's the height of hypocrisy to see this as being anti-Government.

"Most of the problems in the countryside were caused by the previous Government, who mishandled the beef crisis. You cannot blame a government that's only been in power for nine months."

March organisers said the weight of numbers had woken politicians to the strength of feeling over countryside issues. It was the largest single demonstration since the CND rallies in the early 1980s.

Despite complaints by prominent members of the march and politicians that the protest was dominated by pro-hunt campaigners, the organisers claimed it had been a major success.

Paul Latham, for the Countryside Alliance, said: "It shows that the rural lobby is alive and a force in politics."

More than 2,000 coaches and 29 special trains made their way to London from all over the country. Cheering marchers took more than five hours to snake their way from the Thames through Trafalgar Square to Hyde Park.

Converted for the new archive on 30 June 2000. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.