FUEL tax protestors are planning a massive convoy from Jarrow to London in a bid to turn up the pressure on Chancellor Gordon Brown, The Northern Echo can reveal.

Trucks, tractors, taxis and coaches are expected to take part in the slow-moving cavalcade as it criss-crosses the country, highlighting the campaign to cut the tax on fuel.

Organisers are hoping up to 5,000 vehicles will join the procession which has been dubbed a new version of the 1936 Jarrow Crusade, when 200 unemployed men marched from the North-East to London.

The convoy plans will be announced by protest organisers next week.

It is due to arrive in the capital on November 14, where campaigners hope one million people will gather for a protest march.

Proposals for the cavalcade had been shelved at a meeting in Gateshead earlier this month but the People's Fuel Lobby, made up of hauliers, farmers, taxi drivers and coach operators, has now revived the idea.

About 150 vehicles are expected to start from the Birtley truck stop off the A1 at 8am on November 10.

A small contingent will detour to drive past the Shell oil refinery at Jarrow, blockaded during last month's protest, before joining the rest of the convoy driving through the centre of Newcastle.

Consett farmer Andy Spence, one of the convoy organisers, said: "It is a millennium version of the Jarrow march to coincide with the protest in London. We have had dialogue with the Government but nothing positive whatsoever, so it will be going ahead.

"We expect to have 3,000 to 5,000 vehicles by the time we reach London, including taxi drivers and a fish and chip van."

He said the convoy would travel at about 20-25mph and tractors, banned from motorways, would be loaded onto wagons and then unloaded when they reached minor roads.

After leaving Newcastle, the convoy will head to Middlesbrough, York, Leeds, Manchester, Stoke, Birmingham and Northampton and then into London.

It is also expected to be joined by other vehicles coming from Wales and the west country.

Protestors had given the Government 60 days to respond to their demands and the Hyde Park rally is timed to take place on day 61.

John Coxon, a farmer and haulier from Stanley, County Durham, and a member of the PFL's North-East committee, said they were confident the cavalcade would attract public support.

He said: "We have had so much support and we are going to London for the march anyway. We're not causing any disruption, we are showing a presence and not trying to slow anybody down."

He said police had not been contacted about the convoy but pledged it would go ahead in any event.

"We're quite prepared to work along with the police but we will be going down to London and there is no way they can stop us. It is a peaceful protest," he said.

He said Government suggestions of a rebate for rural drivers or for essential users or a £400 reduction off the road tax for hauliers did not address the problem of the UK's high fuel tax.

"It is up to the public to show their faces and back what is being done for them," he said.

"People should take notice and this is why we're going to call it the 2000 Jarrow Crusade."