TONIGHT'S vote on military action in Iraq is set to split East Lancashire MPs down the middle.

Rossendale and Darwen's Janet Anderson, her Hyndburn Labour colleague Greg Pope and Ribble Valley Tory Nigel Evans will join Blackburn's Jack Straw in backing an invasion of Iraq.

But Burnley's Peter Pike and Pendle's Gordon Prentice were today set to defy Tony Blair and vote against a new Gulf War.

The Prime Minister and Foreign Secretary Mr Straw were busy today trying to restrict the scale of any revolt to around the 122 that voted against the government last week.

They fear they might have to rely on Conservative votes in order to get approval from the Commons to send British troops into war.

Mr Pope and Mr Prentice are set to repeat their vote of last week.

But Mrs Anderson - who agonised for days before backing the government in the previous debate - is now determined to give it her full support.

She said: "Tony Blair has bent over backwards to get further UN authorisation for this military action. But he was prevented from getting it by France. There is now no other way to rid the world of the tyrant Saddam Hussein."

Last night Mr Straw made an impassioned plea for MPs to back the government.

He said: "Some say that Iraq can be disarmed without an ultimatum, without the threat or the use of force, but simply by more time and more inspections.

"That approach is defied by all our experience over 12 weary years. It cannot produce a disarmament of Iraq. It cannot rid the world of the danger of the Iraqi regime."