MORE than 200 off-duty Lancashire police officers today joined 18,000 colleagues from across the country in a protest march over a pay offer.

The unprecedented day of action, organised by the Police Federation, saw off-duty officers walking through Westminster and Whitehall to protest over Home Secretary Jacqui Smith's decision to delay a 2.5 per cent pay rise.

They set off from London's Park Lane earlier today where they were jeered by a small group of anarchist counter-protesters.

At the march's conclusion, thousands of officers are due to take part in a "mass queue" outside the Houses of Parliament to lobby their MPs.

Federation chairman Jan Berry will then present a petition to 10 Downing Street and then meet the Home Secretary, after a rally of 3,500 officers in Westminster.

Steve Edwards, chairman of Lancashire Police Federation, said: "There is an unprecedented feeling of anger and mistrust of the Home Secretary amongst police officers.

"Many feel that they have been let down and undervalued by a Government that time and time again publicly praises police officers and the jobs they do yet bullies us into an unfair, unreasonable and unjust pay settlement."

Officers claim that because the increase was backdated to December 1 instead of September 1, it is effectively only a 1.9 per cent increase.

The Police Federation said has revealed it has applied for judicial review of the Home Secretary's decision, which she has defended as necessary to keep inflation and interest rates under control.

As the officers were marching towards Westminster Gordon Brown was forced to defend the pay award, which was back-dated for officers in Scotland but not in the rest of the UK.

Speaking at Prime Minister's Questions, Mr Brown told MPs: "There has been a 39 per cent rise in police pay over the last 10 years.

"I think people do understand that in the fight against inflation it was necessary to stage public sector pay awards.

"I would like to have given the police more, I would like to have given the nurses more, I would like to have given those public sector workers who found there wages staged more.

"But if pay rises are wiped out by ever rising inflation then no benefit goes to either the police or to anybody who receives these benefits."