RIGHTS of Way legislation is "complicated and antiquated" according to frustrated countryside users who attended a public meeting in East Dorset.

More than 120 attended the meeting at Cranborne Village Hall called in response to complaints about gangs of irresponsible motorcyclists churning up the local countryside.

Many residents called for rights of way legislation dating back hundreds of years to be tightened up claiming the Rights of Way Act 1958 and Countryside and Rights of Way Act 2000 had allowed bikers and four-wheel-drive vehicles access to land through legal loopholes.

Numerous people spoke of bikers coming from outside Dorset to Bridleway 17 at Castle Hill near Cranborne, stating they left horseriders terrified, had injured walkers and left the routes damaged.

One man said: "It's nothing for us to have 10 bikes a time - these people don't come from around here and they are not bothered who they spray mud over."

Another said: "This is a new phenomenon in the countryside - get them off the paths."

But biker group representatives blamed the trouble on a minority.

Terry Sweeney from the county council said people often claimed to have historical proof that there were additional rights on a bridleway, and until those rights were disproved they were entitled to continue using motorbikes and four-wheel-drive vehicles on it.

Robert Walter MP agreed to help find a solution in Parliament and if necessary table an amendment via a Private Member's Bill to the Countryside Rights of Way Act 2000, which has still to be introduced.