Petrol tankers were back on Britain's roads last night following an intervention by Prime Minister Mr Tony Blair in the petrol price protest that has starved the country of supplies.
Earlier, with lives at risk and the National Health Service under "massive pressure", Mr Blair had ordered oil companies and police to "get the tankers moving" and ensure supplies as more than half the country's petrol stations ran dry. Late last night hauliers and other protesters complained of "heavy-handed" police action as an initial 15 tankers - five from Purfleet, in Essex, and 10 from Grangemouth in Scotland - hit the roads.
The chief executive of BP, Mr Chris Gibson Smith, told BBC's Newsnight that these were directed at priority health and food distribution services. However, the police action at Grangemouth, involving a surprise swoop involving some 260 officers, brought angry predictions of a "go-slow" protest by lorry drivers across Scotland this morning.
Mr Gibson Smith hinted at a plan for a rolling programme of tanker releases once drivers were satisfied about their personal safety. Yesterday, after a day of intensive talks at 10 Downing Street - and amid mounting ministerial impatience at the apparent reluctance of oil companies and police to break the unofficial picket lines threatening to bring Britain to a standstill - Mr Blair said everything was in place to bring the crisis to an end.
He assured the public the fuel situation would be "on the way back to normal" within 24 hours.
The government had made the necessary emergency Order of Council; the oil companies were agreed they must move supplies; the police would do "all that is necessary" to protect against intimidation; and the main union had issued a strong statement urging members to work normally, said a solemn Mr Blair.
Signalling no concession to the widespread demand for a cut in fuel duty, he told reporters: "I believe that whatever the rights and wrongs of the argument over fuel duty, we cannot accept - as a government or as a nation - that policy should be dictated by illegal blockades, pickets or direct action."
There were almost immediate reports of a changed relationship between police and protesters as they vowed to continue their stranglehold at terminals and refineries across England, Scotland and Wales.
While the protests had been "good-natured" so far, the president of the Police Superintendents' Association, Mr Peter Gammon, predicted the police operation would be "stepped up" to ensure the protection of essential services.
The government had assumed emergency powers at a special meeting of the Privy Council presided over by Queen Elizabeth at Balmoral on Monday night, but ministers had resisted using troops, while retaining the option, as Mr Blair pressured the oil companies and police to act. As he did so, the sense of crisis that had forced him to abandon his regional tour and return to London built throughout the day.
By late last night the RAC Foundation said petrol stations across the Britain were in danger of running out of supply, with the north and south-west of England and much of Scotland, Wales and London already "running on dry". By early evening Shell said 1,070 of its 1,100 stations were closed, while Texaco reported 1,000 of its 1,500 without supplies.
As Mr Blair and the Chancellor, Mr Gordon Brown, again ruled out a "quick fix" solution to the problem of mounting fuel costs, the Department of Health painted a nightmare scenario unfolding of ambulance-drivers, paramedics and hospital workers unable to get to work; medicines and medical supplies running short; GPs and district nurses unable to visit elderly and vulnerable people in their homes; and accident and emergency units coming under mounting pressure as doctors found it more difficult to respond to calls for home visits.
With operations being cancelled across the country, a spokesman for the department said: "There is no doubt that the longer the blockades continue, the more chance there is of lives being put at risk."
In Manchester, fuel was being siphoned from ambulances to community health visitors' cars, while in London, where services were said to be "on a knife edge".
With Scotland's only refinery at Grangemouth paralysed by a group of some 60 hauliers, some 30,000 commuters in Aberdeen had their journeys to work disrupted by protests, while there were reports of rationing in the Highlands and a virtual petrol-free zone in the central belt as lorry-drivers demonstrated against Mr Brown's presence at the TUC conference in Glasgow. In addition to non-emergency operations, school bus services and rubbish collections were also affected in Wales.