The government has been warned that it faces a "long fight" over a ban on hunting.

The announcement follows last night's rowdy Commons debate on the hunting issue.

"When people are treated unfairly, when their voices are not heard, when they are treated as second class citizens, then they get angry and I cannot blame them," said the Countryside Alliance spokesman Simon Hart.

MPs last night backed the government's compromise bill amid angry scenes at Westminster.

Alun Michael appealed for "respect" after countryside campaigners scuffled with police in Parliament Square.

Protesters blockaded Westminster as the Commons debated the future of hunting with hounds.

The rowdy scenes prompted Labour MPs and ministers to attack violent countryside supporters of field sports.

Reading MP Martin Salter interrupted the debate to tell the chamber that "a lighted flare was thrown by pro-hunt supporters at the Labour MP for Milton Keynes South West (Phyllis Starkey)".

"Is this their idea of free speech and a genuine expression of protest?" he asked.

MPs also spoke out against the government's compromise deal which would allow hunting with hounds to continue in some areas.

The bill, which anti-hunt MPs hope to amend, was given its second reading by 368 votes to 155 - although scores of Labour MPs criticised anything short of a total ban.

Former frontbencher Gerald Kaufman said the bill as it stood would "arouse outrage in the Labour movement".

But there were loud calls from the pro-hunt lobby too.

Baroness Mallalieu, the president of the Countryside Alliance, warned the government that it faced "a serious amount of trouble" if it refused to back down on plans to restrict hunting.

"We don't want an unjust bill, which does not have the support of the community to which it applies and I think we are looking at a serious amount of trouble if that happens. I think it would be rather serious," she said.

"Communities feel they have been very badly let down. They have shown enormous restraint and if they feel they have been treated unjustly, having put their arguments, they will feel excluded."

The rural affairs minister hit back at the demonstrators.

"Given the amount of time I have taken to listen again and again to such groups it is disappointing that they are not showing similar respect to the processes and to parliament," he told MPs.

Appealing against a "tribal" conflict over hunting legislation, Michael told campaigners that it was time for parliament and not protestors to have the last word.

"In a free society everyone has the right of peaceful protest. But I would remind the Countryside Alliance and their supporters that the process I have undertaken has involved them at every stage and has been every bit as open and transparent as they asked," he said.

"It is now for parliament to look at the outcome of that work and take the decisions.

"I ask the Countryside Alliance and their supporters, including the more extreme wings and some Tory MPs, to show the respect to parliament that I have shown to them over the last few months."