BUCKS County Council's failure to restore the historic public right of way in the countryside sends an important message to the electorate about their councillors' competence.

Since March 22, the council ignored official advice that states that the [footpath closure] action was disproportionate to the risk and not justified on veterinary grounds. Most paths could have reopened weeks ago. The public is capable of heeding official advice, of course, but the council is above trusting the public.

Footpath officers were aiming to have just 50 per cent of the network opened by June. We must not blame them, but councillors who have belligerently insisted on making the process a ludicrous, bureaucratic joke.

There is one other villain: The National Farmers Union. We can look forward to bleating representatives bemoaning lack of compensation the taxpayer will fork out for the impacts of the disease on subsidised, intensive farming that first hastened the spread.

But meanwhile, the NFU is not encouraging farmers to open footpaths. Instead, with the council's complicity, we must go crawling to them to seek their approval. Paths across arable fields, subsidised by you and I, remained mysteriously closed.

On June 7, councillors will seek votes. This shambolic affront to public rights is a measure of their competence. Locally, some councillors have responded helpfully and constructively to my complaints.

Others have been flippant or plain negligent. If other readers have had the same treatment, I urge them to remember that on June 7.

Trevor Lawson, Red Fox Media, Amersham