The Government is being accused of dragging its feet as a row broke out over the lifting of foot-and-mouth restrictions.

National Farming Union chiefs in the North-East said officials were being overly cautious in moves to free counties of curbs.

But officials at the Department for the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) hit back, claiming the NFU were not in full position of the facts.

The NFU says it is worried that farmers in so-called "high-risk" areas such as North Yorkshire and County Durham still cannot re-stock their herds from other parts of the country.

The high risk category means that farmers can only move stock too and from adjoining high-risk counties.

Laurie Norris, NFU policy adviser for the North-East, said it could be mid-January before Defra finally cleared affected areas of the disease which was too late for many farmers.

She said: "The Government's chief vet Jim Scudamore wants more blood testing of sheep to be done in high risk areas.

"But we have spoken to vets and they are confident that there is no disease left.

"It is a case of London being over cautious and making it very difficult for farmers and their day to day operations."

Sheep are tested for latent signs of the foot-and-mouth virus as they can carry it without showing any obvious symptoms of the disease.

Once completed, and the all-clear having been given, high risk counties are then declared "at risk" and restrictions can be eased slightly.

Three further months must pass before an area is deemed entirely free of risk.

Farmers argue that current curbs mean they are restricted to re-stocking in areas where often there are not enough animals of high quality to go round.

Beverley Parr, of Defra, said: "There is strict criteria which dictates when counties change their status.

"The NFU would not be in a position to know what blood testing was necessary or whether it had been done.

"And in terms of being over cautious there is no such thing. People are working on the ground as fast as they can to make the changes necessary but there are no short cuts."