VILLAGERS in Prime Minister Tony Blair's constituency have branded as despicable a millionaire's plans to buy land near their homes and sell it to travellers.

Businessman Len Gridley claims to have identified land worth £500,000 in Mr Blair's constituency in Sedgefield, County Durham, Deputy Prime Minister John Prescott's constituency in Hull, and Home Secretary David Blunkett's constituency in Sheffield.

Unless the Government evicts travellers from a site near his parents' home in Essex, by next May, Mr Gridley will buy the land and sell it to travellers.

Mr Gridley, 45, said that he had watched in horror over the years as land next to the home he bought for his parents' retirement had been encompassed by what is known as the biggest travellers' site in the country, at Cray's Hill, near Billericay, Essex.

He said: "I am convinced that nothing else will work. I am doing this to blackmail the Government if you like.

"I am fed up with seeing lovely little villages and communities suffering.

"It is time someone did something to ram the issue home to the complacent leaders of this country."

But Mike Gibson, of Dove (Defend Our Village Environment), in Sedgefield, said the only people who were going to suffer were the people in the targeted villages, not Mr Blair, who lives in nearby Trimdon.

He said: "We think it is despicable that somebody could do this to the communities, knowing full well what would happen. It is not Tony Blair who is going to suffer, it is the residents in the villages. How often is he in the village?"

Mr Gibson said there was already a problem with travellers in Old Beacon Lane, Sedgefield, where Dove is campaigning to have a lockable gate installed to prevent travellers camping and to reduce problems of anti-social behaviour.

He said: "Travellers are only just a part of the problem at Beacon Lane - the issue is about anti-social behaviour.

"Of course, it is not all travellers. You have the true Romanies who park up in their horse-drawn caravan for a couple of days then move on.

"They always tidy up after themselves. We do have a problem with itinerant travellers who stay for a few days and dump rubbish.

"I don't know where this man has in mind but there is very little land for sale around here."