SIR - The news that Skipton's pub licensees have collectively banned' Gordon Brown from all their premises as a protest against his government's smoking ban is a wonderful, albeit futile, gesture.

But what if every affected business in the UK were to ban all those MPs who actually voted in favour of that smoking law?

That would really bring home the message to the guilty' and might even stimulate some rational debate and a more reasoned outcome.

Although Harriet Harman may not be too discomforted at being excluded from Britain's bingo halls, a couple of hundred other MPs may find it quite difficult to fraternise with their safe-seat' electorate if suddenly barred from every pub and working men's club in the land. Worth a try?

Graham Hoyle, Kirkbourne Grove, Baildon