North Yorkshire's pig farmers descended on the nation's capital in their hundreds on Saturday.

They filled the centre of London with noise as they banged on their placards, blew whistles and chanted "Tony Blair, do you care?"

The 3,500 people converged on Temple Place from all over the country included about 400 from North Yorkshire, who travelled down on the 13-carriage Pig Express from York station.

Some were dressed in pig costumes, many wore black armbands and a coffin was carried to mourn the death of the pig industry.

They marched along the Embankment, passed the Houses of Parliament and turned up Whitehall, where a petition was handed in at

Downing Street by members of the British Pig Industry Support Group calling for action to halt the ever-worsening pig industry crisis.

Finally, they gathered in Trafalgar Square for speeches by the group's leading figures, including John Rowbottom, of Melbourne, near Pocklington.

The day's events were considered a great success. Mr Rowbottom said: "I thought the atmosphere was tremendous, there were enough people there to make it amazing. Everybody had a great day out, it was brilliant.

"Our objectives were to make the public, the supermarkets and the Government aware that our industry is in a desperate state. We are asking the British public to buy British produce and after today they might listen."

He said that further action would follow the march: "We may have to get more militant. We will make our presence felt at distribution depots, but in a peaceful way. We must take our destiny in our own hands."

Among those on the march was Robert Staveley, owner of Flamingo Land, who also has a pig farm near Ripon. He made the coffin that was carried at the front of the march. He said: "It is important that we get across to people that by buying foreign pig meat they are condemning sows to terrible conditions.

"We are at the end of our tether. We get 65 pence a kilo for our meat, that's about 27 pence a pound and that's cheaper than vegetables.

If I didn't have other businesses I would have gone under by now. We keep pigs, but they do not keep us."

With the slogan "Put pork on your fork", the farmers urged the public to look for the mark of distinction, the quality standard for pork, bacon and ham.

The National Farmers' Union says that the UK's welfare standards are the highest in the world with a high level of traceability back to the farm and that British pig food does not contain meat and bonemeal.

It also says that British pig farmers have completed their change to a more welfare friendly loose housing system at a great cost. The major pork producing countries which send pigmeat to the UK still use stalls and tethers.

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