I HAVE written to Prime Minister Gordon Brown to express the disgust and disillusionment of our local community at the so-called "consultation process" concerning our local post office.

It is now clear his Cabinet's policies were not to be influenced in any way, whatever the strength of the case and however we tried as decent citizens to put forward a logical and soundly argued case for the retention of this service.

Why did he bother to go through the charade of the consultation period?

It is now only too clear that minds were made up from the start. Not one of the 37 selected local post offices in our area has survived.

Can Mr Brown calculate how many more good citizens his Government has now alienated?

There may have been even stronger cases for survival than our own, but nobody in authority either cared or was interested in the significant facts of the individual cases.

As I am sure he knows by now, these actions are long remembered by those who have been hurt and will add to his eventual day of reckoning - which may be coming sooner than he would choose.

AR Cook, Swainby, Northallerton, North Yorkshire