FRENCH officials have halted a North-East mercy mission - after discovering its cargo contained 500 Cadbury's Creme Eggs.

Customs authorities say the eggs - packed among 44 tonnes of essential supplies for Romanian orphanages - could risk spreading foot-and-mouth disease.

The French fear the eggs could have been made with the milk of infected British cows.

The Romanian driver, who cannot speak French or English, was told to either unload the 40ft trailer or turn around and return to the charity's Stockton base.

Rod Jones, founder of Convoy Aid, is extremely annoyed that Easter may now be cancelled for the orphans.

"I just can't believe this," he said. "They have got to be off their trolley. It is just paranoia."

To add to the confusion, no one can remember exactly where on the lorry the Easter eggs are stored.

They are stowed somewhere among pallets of paint, beds, bath hoists and tinned milk, wheelchairs, school furniture and disinfectant. It took a team of volunteers 12 hours to load the lorry earlier this week.

Rod said: "The driver was told that the eggs, which are in a sealed metal food containers, cannot be transported across Europe from England.

"He tried to tell them the eggs were for the children. They are talking about either unloading the lorry or sending it back to Britain.

"If you so much as put a wheelchair back the wrong way, a bed upside down or a wardrobe at an angle, it's mission impossible to get the rest back in."

Cadbury's insist the eggs are perfectly safe and have offered to write a letter for Convoy Aid to present to the French.