Protesters against controversial plans to build more pylons in the North Yorkshire countryside say they may forcibly remove National Grid (NG) staff from their land.

Members of Revolt (Rural England Versus Overhead Line Transmission) claim they found NG staff in a field where a pylon could be built, despite the field's owner saying they could not enter.

They say that unless there is extra police action to remove "trespassers" from land, they will do it themselves.

Revolt chairman Mike O'Carroll said the incident took place on a farm at Winton, near Northallerton.

Farmer Alan Turner found the National Grid workers in his field and asked them to leave, Professor O'Carroll said. When they refused, he rang the police.

Mr O'Carroll said police officers attended, but did not remove the National Grid staff.

He said: "We can't allow the company to continue with this behaviour, and if the police won't take action we may have to.

"We would prefer to leave any action of this sort to the police, but we are entitled to use reasonable force to evict trespassers if we need to."

He said the legal position has been established through a parliamentary question from Vale of York MP Anne McIntosh.

"For exploratory work, they don't need permission. But this was no exploration. They made it clear they were using the Compulsory Wayleave Act which means they do need permission," he said.

A National Grid spokesman said the company had worked hard to agree access to construct the new overhead line.

They had managed to achieve this in the vast majority of cases, the spokesman claimed.

"The access difficulties at Mr Turner's farm were regrettable and are very much the exception.

"We are confident that we have acted reasonably and entirely within our legal rights, granted by the Secretary of State in the necessary wayleave, and we have been negotiating with Mr Turner since 1999.

"He was given notice that access was required," the spokesman added.

Northallerton-based police sergeant Kevin Thornton said he was aware of the incident at Winton, but records showed the National Grid staff had left the field immediately.

It was possible they had permission to work on land very close to Mr Turner's, he said.

Sgt Thornton said: "Reasonable force is always a grey area. But if someone removes a member of National Grid's staff from somewhere they are entitled to be then there is a potential problem.

Updated: 11:06 Monday, May 21, 2001