THOUSANDS gathered in a snowy, frost-bitten field to declare their utter opposition to any sale of the Forest of Dean.

Despite sub-zero temperatures, crowds gathered to hear speeches from Baroness Jan Royall, environmentalist, Jonathon Porritt and messages from conservationist, David Bellamy and the leader of the Hands off Our Forest campaign, freeminer Rich Daniels.

"We are a broad group, a broad church," Daniels told the massed crowd. "We're here to help you save the Forest and we're here because of the Public Bodies Bill which will allow the minister to do anything he pleases with our Forest. Selling off our Forest? That is something we can't have."

Jan Royall said: "This is the beginning of the international year of the Forest and we are here to defend our ancient privileges and traditions.

"The Forest has a long history of struggle and today we are continuing in that tradition. We can't and must not allow our Forest to be sold. We shouldn't even consider the question of whether we should buy the Forest, it already belongs to us.

Jonathon Porritt said: "This is a living human community as well as a ecological community and that has massive value. What this government seems to want to do is sell off as much as possible as quickly as possible. This rhetoric about the 'big society' is just another way of describing an idealogically-led privatisation campaign."

• A CD of music and poetry from the rally featuring Dick Brice's 'Land Between Two Rivers', Asha Faria-Vare, Mike Edwards, Roger Drury, Ghost of a Dog and Bob Smith will be recorded in the coming weeks and will be available through the HOOF website: www. handsoffourforest.org