Campaigners fighting to protect the South Downs face a five-year wait before the promised national park will be created.

The Government expects it to be 2006 before the park is operating, two years longer than countryside chiefs believed the process would take.

A briefing note, drawn up for MPs by the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra), says the earliest a park could be created is spring 2004.

A public inquiry, which is almost certain, would be likely to delay designation two more years.

This would mean a seven-year gap between John Prescott's Labour Party conference pledge to create a national park in the South Downs and national park status being granted Chris Todd, of the South Downs Campaign, said: "We are very, very concerned if this is true. We will be seeking assurances from the Government that this is not the case.

"We see no reason for it to be delayed beyond the Countryside Agency's timetable, which included a public inquiry.

"We have waited long enough for this, there is no reason to delay any further."

The Countryside Agency, which begins consultation on creating the park later this month, expects to hand its recommendations to ministers next September.

The agency expected the park to be created early in 2004, with a public inquiry.

A Defra spokesman confirmed a functioning park was unlikely to be in place before 2006.

The South Downs is the only area which was identified as a possible national park in the late Forties which has not won the extra protection park status would bring.

If the Conservatives win the next General Election, which has to take place before mid-2006, the park plan could be scrapped.

Tory controlled councils, backed by many Sussex MPs, are still fighting the proposal, largely over whether the ruling national park authority should take control of planning.

Brighton Pavilion MP David Lepper said he hoped the agency and Defra could work as fast as possible and a public inquiry, which has to be called if councils object to the plan, would not be needed.

He said: "With plain sailing we are looking at a national park authority for the South Downs up and running in April 2004."