FARMERS have threatened to blockade a landfill site with a 'wall of tractors' to stop it being used as a burial ground for an estimated 6,000 foot and mouth victims.

The threat from farmers came as Government plans to use Whitehead tip -- midway between Boothstown and Astley --on Monday were blocked at the 11th hour when Wigan Council launched an investigation to see if doing so would breach planning conditions.

But it seems the respite could be just temporary with the Government having emergency powers to ignore the council's objections if it wishes.

The tip is on a national list of more than 120 drawn up by the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food (MAFF) to take pig and sheep carcasses killed in the 'firebreak' cull. This includes animals on uninfected farms killed because they were in the exclusion zone around an infected farm.

But John Harrison, who has 75 cattle and 50 sheep at his Moss House farm at Boothstown, which borders the tip alongside Vicar's Hall Lane, said angry farmers planned to disrupt the site to protest at animals from infected areas being dumped in an uninfected area.

He said: "If they start dumping carcasses at that tip we are going to go down there with our tractors and blockade it.

"There will be around 20 of us and we will really slow things down. I can't understand why they want to bring animals from infected areas into clear areas."

He added: "My cattle graze right up next to that tip and if my animals get infected every animal for a two mile radius will have to be killed as well. That could be as much as 2,000 animals culled in the surrounding area."

Another farmer near the tip, who asked not to be named, said farmers were anxious to keep their stock clear because they hoped, once the crisis was over, to sell animals to farmers whose stock had been culled.

Vehicles dump waste at the Whitehead tip via a specially constructed access road which runs off the Liverpool-bound carriageway of the A580 on the Leigh side of Morley's Bridge. They cut through farmland and across Lower Green Lane at Astley depositing their load on the landfill site created on the old colliery waste rucks.

Bedford and Astley Cllr John Lea said an attempt to dump animals on Monday had been stopped by the council because it only allowed 'roadkill' animals to be dumped there and not tonnes of carcasses.

Only a direct order from the Department of the Environment could overrule that, he added.

But he said he believed MAFF planned to dump 1,000 sheep and 500 pigs initially at the tip and eventually, when repairs were carried out, 4,000 sheep and 2,000 pigs a day.

A spokesman for Wigan Council confirmed: "We are taking legal advice with regard to whether dumping animals in the tip breaks planning conditions. Obviously we are very concerned about this."

Salford Cllr Bob Boyd, who represents Worsley and Boothstown, said residents' fears about foot and mouth had to be respected. But he added: "I think it is inevitable that the tip will eventually be used -- it is one of the best suited to the job."

Meanwhile, the tip's owner Virador has refused to reveal how much money it expects to make from the disposal of culled animals at the tip.

Unconfirmed estimates have suggested that they could make as much as £200,000 a day.

But a spokesman said: "That is commercially sensitive information, but the situation has not changed.

"The site has been made available and will be used when required as directed by the Government and the Intervention Board (which helps MAFF dispose of culled carcasses.) We haven't received any carcasses or been given any indication of when in fact it will happen -- but we remain on standby."

He added a meeting with residents last Thursday had been positive and said the company would keep the public informed of developments.

A spokesman for the Intervention Board said it had not made any decision on whether or not to use the Whitehead tip.