with David Higgs
Thousands of post offices may be under threat throughout the UK, but villagers at Colwall, near Ledbury, were celebrating last week when their local branch re-opened after a year’s closure.
BBC TV cameras were on hand as postmaster Nigel Morris and his wife Sara opened the doors for business as usual, after a 12-month break in the post office service when personal circumstances forced the previous tenant to shut up shop.
Nigel said: “We have re-opened the post office as a joint effort with the parish council which has taken out a loan for the lease for three years – which equates to about £5 extra per household on the parish rates per year – while we have been responsible for re-fitting with new counters and other facilities.
“The lease reverts to us after three years and meanwhile – thanks to the support of the community – this is a way of spreading the load.
“We’ve had a really good customer response since re-opening, which helps to ensure that money withdrawn, for example, stays in the local economy,” added Nigel, who has been in a post office career for the past 26 years, and who has run the Malvern Post Office with his wife since 1996.
“It’s fantastic to get it open, we’ve had a really good reaction,” said Parish Council Clerk Karen Davis. “It was something that the village wanted because people didn’t want to have to travel three or four miles for the service.”
“People who live in more urban locations sometimes take these services for granted but in rural locations it’s terribly important to have something at the heart of the village.”
The opening represents a buck in the current trend for rural post offices 22 of which are under threat from closure in Herefordshire alone.
Both the Conservative and Liberal Democrat parties are opposed to the plans.
Colwall’s Tory MP Bill Wiggin has slammed the the proposals while Hereford’s MP Paul Keetch lent his support to a petition of 3,235 names opposed to the closures in March.
