JOHN Major was today digging in for a long haul to a May 1 election after surviving last night's crunch vote on Ministers' handling of the mad cow disease crisis.

His government won by a comfortable 13 votes after buying off the Ulster Unionists with a promise of an early lifting of the export ban on certified BSE free Northern Irish beef and extra cash for the province's dairy farmers.

But Labour's deputy leader, John Prescott, promised to keep up the pressure on the Government in a bid to force an earlier poll and claimed the debate had exposed the Ministers' incompetence over BSE. The Tory victory left Labour licking its wounds and other cattle farmers anxiously awaiting the details of the scheme being submitted to the European Commission by Agriculture Minister Douglas Hogg.

Mr Hogg, whose conduct was the focus for the censure vote, will put new plans to Brussels in the next few days and hopes to see the embargo on Ulster beef lifted within the next two months.

Today, the Tories accused Labour of pulling a political stunt aimed at triggering a General Election, and wasting time and money by dragging three Ministers back from overseas for the vote.

But Mr Prescott was unrepentant and warned of more of the same after the Wirral South by-election on February 27 which the Tories are expected to lose.

Converted for the new archive on 14 July 2000. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.