North-East taxpayers are facing a £1m "lunch bill" as President George Bush prepares to fly into the region on Friday.

After weeks of speculation, Downing Street finally confirmed yesterday that Mr Bush will visit Prime Minister Tony Blair's Sedgefield constituency at the end of his state visit to the UK starting today.

The president is expected to be greeted by hundreds of anti-war protesters from the region, while North-East MPs have also expressed disquiet over the timing of the visit.

But aside from the political fall-out over the trip, a huge row is brewing over whether local taxpayers - or the Government - should meet the estimated £1m cost of policing it.

Durham Constabulary confirmed that more than 1,300 police officers will be on duty on Friday in what they said would be the biggest operation they have ever mounted.

All police leave has been cancelled and hundreds of officers have been drafted from the neighbouring Northumbria and Cleveland forces.

Assistant Chief Constable Gary Barnett, who is heading the security operation, said the force would be applying to the Home Office to recoup the cost of the policing the visit.

But pressed on the issue by The Journal, Downing Street signalled the bill would have to be met out of the force's existing budget, part of which comes from council taxpayers. Mr Barnett said yesterday: "The operation is not one which the allocation of funding for Durham would ordinarily be expected to cover. It is a very complex operation. It involves a lot of expense for which the force has not been able to budget, and discussions are ongoing with the Home Office," he added.

However Mr Blair's spokesman said: "There are budgets which go to police authorities to cover their costs and this will be funded in the usual way from the usual budgets that they have."

The vice chairman of Durham police authority yesterday admitted members had not been given any details of the visit, or how much it will cost to the council taxpayers.

Durham Police Authority vice-chairman Joe Knox said: "We have not been kept informed of what is happening. Once the visit is over we will be raising a number of questions, and demanding answers.

"We will certainly want to know who will eventually foot the bill."

A similar row is brewing in London where the Metropolitan Police is demanding the Home Office recoup a £5.5m bill for an operation involving 14,000 officers.

Mr Bush will fly to the region on Friday morning for lunch with Mr Blair and some of his constituents at an undisclosed venue in the Sedgefield area, before returning to the US with his wife Laura.

As revealed by The Journal last week, there had been plans for the president to make a longer stay in the region, taking in visits to Durham Castle and Durham Cathedral. However this idea appears to have been scuppered by objections from the US secret services over security implications.

Leaders of the anti Iraq war coalition in the region will be meeting tonight to finalise their plans for a demonstration against the visit.

"People are going to be meeting to plan some imaginative protests that will hopefully get our message across," said spokesman Phil Capon.

Mr Barnett said the police operation would be designed to "balance the needs of security against people's rights to demonstrate peacefully."

The Journal: Today's Voice of the North 

Page 2: Standing firm on invite to Bush