THE first of the region's 200 doomed post offices will be announced in only six weeks, after the government confirmed a mass closure programme yesterday.

More than one in six outlets will close - about 2,500 nationwide - with struggling sub-post officers offered a package of up to £60,000 if they agree to shut their doors.

The cull suggests about 200 will disappear in the North-East and North Yorkshire - almost as many as in the past six years combined. Within six weeks, the first "area plans" will be drawn up to identify the outlets earmarked for closure, which will then each be subject to a further six-week consultation.

Most of the sub-post offices will be in rural areas, although towns and cities - which have accounted for most of the recent closures - will also be hit.

Speaking in the Commons, Industry Secretary Alistair Darling insisted the closures were necessary to stem losses running at £4m a week, and to save the rest of the network.

But Conservative spokesman Alan Duncan accused Mr Darling of paving the way for the "near-certain death of the village post office". He said: "I'm afraid this statement confirms many people's worst fears that our post office network is about to be decimated."

Susan Kramer, for the Liberal Democrats, said: "Villages that have already lost their school and shops, and elderly residents in the suburbs who risk losing their independence, face a bleak future."

The department of trade and industry (Dti) was forced to concede that none of the 2,500 responses it received during a three-month consultation had backed the closure programme.

There would also be "some natural exits" - without compensation - which would be likely to take the total number of closures above 2,500.

But Mr Darling said the closures were unavoidable, as more people paid bills over the internet and received benefits directly into bank accounts. He pledged a £1.7bn investment into surviving outlets until 2011 and announced a new post office broadband service in partnership with BT.

About 500 "outreach" outlets will be set up in remote communities, either mobile post offices or services based in village halls, community centres and pubs.

The network will be slimmed down by relaxing the requirements, laid down in 2000, to ensure most people live within a reasonable distance of a post office. The new criteria state that 90 per cent of the population should live within one mile. Within each postcode district, 95 per cent must live within six miles of an outlet.