SIR – Jim Greenhalf (T&A, July 22) asks whether David Cameron’s proposal to hand ‘power to the people’ can work. Early indications are not encouraging.

The only examples of local activity so far suggested involve the running of pubs, post offices and shops, which are under threat of closure and a proposal to delegate planning decisions to village communities. The common thread is that, up to May 6, all such outrages were deemed to be the fault of a Labour government that did not ‘understand the countryside’.

The coalition Government appears to be hoping to avoid similar criticism by saying that in future, what happens to their shops or the building of houses in back gardens would become the responsibility of the locals.

If unwanted developments are given the go-ahead or ‘the community’ is unwilling to prop up failing businesses by taking them over and working in them without payment, then tough.

In other words, you had the power but didn’t use it, so don’t come whining to us when your pub, post office or shop are about to disappear in just the same way as they would have done under Labour.

Brian Holmans, Langley Road, Bingley