DRUIDS have expressed concern about how a tunnel underneath Stonehenge would be constructed but say they support the principle of improving the significant spiritual site.

Speaking at the inquiry on behalf of the Druid Network and British Druid Order, Emma Restall Orr said she hoped to avoid large-scale road protests but the Highways Agency must understand the importance of the monuments and be sympathetic to their use for ritual.

"The reason we are standing here is because we are in the Druid tradition and that gives us a momentum and a sense of importance of this, in a way that other people might not feel," she said.

"But we do represent a wide range of paganisms and the spiritual community at large - anyone who feels that Stonehenge is a sacred place.

"Druidry for us is a spirituality of the land.

"It is about reverence for nature, and that includes human nature, the nature within us and around us, the environment and our ancestry.

"It is a spirituality which honours the ancestors, which is why we stand here, honouring the work of our ancestors through Stonehenge and its sacred landscape."

Mrs Orr said the land surrounding the stones must be restored and Druids would not demand a longer tunnel, as the National Trust has proposed, if it were at the expense of any improvement.

"We do support this scheme with condition," she said.

"It is much more important that something is done to take away the mess that is the present situation."

However, Mrs Orr insisted that thought must be given to several parts of the route, including Longbarrow Crossroads.

"We are concerned about the disruption during the process of construction.

"This does not only mean archaeologically, for us it is also spiritually, magically in terms of energy, disruption to the spirits of the place and to the serenity of the ancestors in this very powerful area.

"We would support any move to take the road further from that important site."

Mrs Orr also expressed concerns about the contractors' compound, which would be located on ley lines in a sacred pathway, and emphasised that Stonehenge should not be described as a resource which is "deeply offensive to the Druid community".

The Druids also requested allocated times for rituals, particularly at parts of the Heritage Sites that would be most disrupted by the work, and that any human remains would be given a pagan reburial.

"If we can work out a way of interacting and communicating through the process of this project, I think this will set a precedent for all of us - both as a world issue looking at archaeology, but also through the spiritual and pagan communities, in terms of how you deal with specifically pagan human remains," added Mrs Orr.