Ripping the heart out of community

WITH more and more Hunts Post readers pledging their support to our campaign to fight potential post offices closures across the district, ANDREW McGILL looked at the effect closing a post office has on the community.

WISTOW lost its post office around eight years ago when the owners decided the combined shop/post office was not making enough money.

Church warden Helen Buddle, who worked in the post office for 40 years, said: "The closure had a devastating effect on the community.

"The post office was a meeting place, a place where you could find out if anyone was ill and needed looking after.

"You used to see familiar faces going up and down the road to the shops but now you can go right round the village and not see a soul."

Mrs Buddle and many villagers signed a petition against the closure, delaying it for one year, but to no avail. Now, the nearest post offices to Wistow are in Ramsey and Warboys, each more than two miles away.

Mrs Buddle, 70, added: "Some people are fortunate and have a car but not everyone is so active. The bus service is relatively good, but for some even getting on a bus is difficult.

"The proposals to close more rural post offices are appalling and I urge everyone to fight for their local post office."

Another community without a post office is Ellington, where villagers are forced to board a bus to Brampton if they want to use postal services.

Parish council chairman Robert Lumbers said: "We used to have a good village store and post office here that was well-supported by local people but that is no longer the case.

"It seems that supermarkets are taking over the world with their wide range of choice and that must be linked to the demise of the post office.

"It is important that rather than people saying they support their local post office but never using it, they get down there and use it to save it.