Should we save them at all costs?

With me selling small car parts on ebay as a sideline, I am a big user of the Post Office.  The odd parcel goes astray, but other than that I think the UK Post Office provides a first class service.

Earlier this year there were a few Post Office closures in this area. One was in a small village of a couple of hundred people and I can see why that one wasn’t economical. Others were in areas of quite high population and the people near to them must have been very disappointed.

So in a town of over 20,000 people we now have 3 Post Offices. 1 is in a Supermarket, one is in a small chemist’s shop and the other is the main Post Office, which I believe is only one of a handful that opens on a Sunday.

As well as taking parcels every week day to my local post office, I take my Mum to get her pension every Saturday morning and we usually spend £15- £20 in the chemist’s shop. A lot of local people rely on this Post Office and chemists and I wonder if the chemists would pay without the Post Office. The nearest one is well over a mile away and in an area which I would think has a large elderly population; many local people would struggle without it. However, that didn’t stop them closing the others.

Business Secretary Peter Mandelson has recently urged Gordon Brown to save the Post Office network, by allowing it to provide a new range of Government services and financial products. The letter had been leaked, but he supposedly suggested that the economic downturn combined with recent events in the financial services, presented a new opportunity for the Post Office. It went on to suggest that the Post Office could offer a wider range of attractive products within easy reach of the whole population; and hopefully prevent 2,500 Post Offices allegedly earmarked for closure, from shutting and no longer being there to serve the community.

Following on from this, it is hopeful that Ministers may be about to give the Post Office a much-needed boost, by announcing that it can retain its five-year £1 billion contract to distribute benefits to 4.3 million claimants. So my Mum will still be able to draw her pension from our local Post office.

This account is a lifeline to many Post Office branches, bringing in valuable trade, but the deal runs out in 2010 and there are fears in the industry that the contract could go to a rival operator.
Unions have warned that the loss of the contract, which makes an annual profit of £200 million, could lead to the closure of more than 2500, Post Offices, perhaps even 3,000. Apparently 2 million people signed a petition and 265 MPs from all parties signed a parliamentary motion calling for it to stay with the Post Office.

So things are looking good, as they should do as the local Post Office is a crucial part of the local community and something that so many people rely on. Only the ones with very poor turnovers that are absolutely uneconomical should be closed. The Government should do everything possible to save them.