Last updated 19:42, Thursday, 08 May 2008

THE FIGHT to save Workington’s under-threat Post Offices has been stepped up.

Workington MP Tony Cunningham has joined with other Cumbrian MPs, Allerdale council and Cumbria county council, to fight for eight branches in the area at risk of closure because of reorganisation of the service.

They include Vulcans Lane and High Harrington post offices in Workington.

Mr Cunningham has met with Post Office bosses and put forward a case for each branch’s survival.

He said: “It’s absolute nonsense. The Post Office has admitted the information it used to determine which branches should close did not come from the actual numbers of users but from a sample - and some of the decisions were made with a lack of financial information.

“Vulcan’s Lane takes about 1,500 transactions a week. If it were to close, those transactions are likely to move to the office on Oxford Street.

“The small Oxford Street Post Office already has queues snaking out the door on a regular basis, so how will it cope with that extra traffic?”

More than 500 people signed a petition for the Vulcan’s Lane Post Office to stay open.

A meeting of Allerdale council’s executive committee on Wednesday said Vulcan’s Lane served areas in Moss Bay which were in the worst three per cent of deprived areas in the country.

There have been recent Post Office closures in neighbouring wards, the town centre branch cannot absorb extra clients, there is restricted car parking and low car ownership.

Allerdale council said that if the High Harrington branch closed it would mean residents walking a dangerous road with restricted pavement access and poor parking at the next nearest branch at Harrington .

Local councils, MPs and organisations such as Active Cumbria met in Kendal this week and decided to join forces.

Mr Cunningham said: “If we collect evidence that these post offices are needed in the communities they serve, there is an opportunity that the closure programme could change.”

Post Office Ltd has proposed to shut branches at Brigham, Broughton Moor, Camerton, Crosby, Grasslot, and Hayton near Aspatria.

The Post Office’s admission that choices were not made on actual numbers have given under-threat branches a lifeline.

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