MINISTERS showed a "real lack of concern" for communities across the Westcountry when ordering the closure of dozens of post offices across the region, a damning report claims today.

The public consultation on the process, which eventually saw 140 branches axed in Devon and Cornwall, is dismissed as "little more than a piece of window dressing" which caused "distress and upheaval" for rural and urban communities.

The powerful Public Accounts Committee (PAC) also warns the Government must now "rectify the weaknesses" in the way it plans the network "by considering the impacts of closure on rural communities".

The Department for Business, Innovation and Skills (BIS) is accused of making an "inadequate assessment" of the social and economic costs of the closure programme.

"It showed a real lack of concern for the citizens affected," said PAC chairman Edward Leigh.

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"The consultation process appeared to the public as little more than a piece of window dressing for a decision which, to all intents and purposes, had already been taken."

He said BIS needed to spell out how it expects remaining branches to survive in the future. And he warned that a looming review of outreach services – including mobile vans and counters set up in pubs and village shops – could yet "result in such services being withdrawn".

In addition to the branches axed outright, some 60 communities across the Westcountry were told they would lose their permanent outlet and would have to rely instead on a diminished outreach service.

Mr Leigh was also highly critical of the low level of expected savings – forecast to be £45 million a year from 2011-12, following a loss of £17 million in each of the five preceding years.

"In view of the distress and upheaval caused to rural and urban communities by the closure programme, and the less-than- impressive financial benefits, compulsory closures of post offices should in future be a last resort, not a first," he said.

The committee claims only a "small percentage" of people were even aware of the consultation and, with a target set for the number of branches needed to close, many felt local concerns were ignored.

The process was so poor it could have brought the whole principle of public consultation "into disrepute", the PAC has said.

More branches are expected to close if sub-postmasters choose to retire or sell their business, but the department and Post Office Ltd are accused of being vague about how they will ensure the network survives.

Today's report is the latest round of criticism for the nationwide Network Change programme, which saw ministers demand 2,500 branches be axed in 2007.

A separate Commons committee warned in July that a "lack of imagination" by Labour ministers to attract more customers to remaining branches put the post office network at risk.

The National Audit Office has also condemned the "feeble attempts" made to involve the public in the process, branding the consultation "a sham".

It all led to the perception that, by setting a target of 2,500 branches to be shut, local people could do little to prevent the inevitable once a branch had been earmarked for closure.

Last night, George Thomson, general secretary of the National Federation of Sub-Postmasters, said he was "bitterly disappointed with ministers' failure so far to champion the network and to make better use of its unrivalled levels of public trust and geographical reach as the natural home for many government services".

"Sub-postmasters are struggling to keep their businesses open and communities and businesses across the country will bear the brunt of future post office closures," he added.

However, postal affairs minister Lord Young insisted the swathes of closures were "difficult but necessary" to rein in substantial losses of half a million pounds a day.

"Now that the closures have taken place and Post Office Limited is on a more sound financial footing, the Government has made it clear that it will not support another round of Post Office closures," he said.