A flotilla of fishing boats has set off to protest against the Prime Minister’s Brexit plans.

The demonstration on the River Tyne comes the day before former Ukip leader Nigel Farage starts out on his March to Leave, from Sunderland to London.

The fishermen’s organisation, Fishing For Leave, set off from North Shields, North Tyneside, up the river and headed for Newcastle’s Quayside.

Brexit
Fishermen sailed along the Tyne in a pro-Brexit protest (Owen Humphreys/PA)

The flotilla made its way through the choppy waters of the Tyne, while a battered trawler was driven on the back of a lorry by road, heading for the meeting point in the city centre.

A Fishing For Leave spokesman said: “The terms of the Withdrawal Agreement are an existential threat to fishing and a total betrayal of Brexit and Britain.

“It means a second surrender of our industry and coastal communities and places a constitutional bomb under democracy.”