Save Our Post Office

Royal Mail Meeting

Save Our Post Office.co.uk — Tue, 15 Aug 2006 05:12:49 +0000

After many calls and communication attempts, it is now confirmed that a delegation of campaigners will be travelling to London on the 24th August 2006 to meet with senior people from Royal Mail to discuss the re-location, examine possible alternatives and to present the letters of support and the petition signatures. More details of who is travelling down to London will be anounced shortly but we expect that Jon Tandy and MP Daniel Kawczynski to be among the delgation.

There are a few other things currently under discussion between local campaigners and the National CWU and we hope to report on those soon.

We would like to thank everyone who has signed the online petition and at the time of writing this; we have 129 signatures online and around 13,000 hand-written signatures to show that the public does not what the post office re-located.

This blog is independent of any political party or organisation

Campaign Pictures

Save Our Post Office.co.uk — Thu, 03 Aug 2006 16:55:00 +0000

Pictures have been added to this blog under the buttons at the top of the page. There are pictures of the campaigning outside of the post office on St Mary’s Street and of the Campaign March that took place on 29 July.

A video of the march will be made available soon as we are in the process of finishing the edit.

This blog is independent of any political party or organisation

Protest March

Save Our Post Office.co.uk — Sat, 29 Jul 2006 17:08:02 +0000

Wow; what a day it’s been. We arrived in the town square next the music hall and began setting up the petitions and posters at around 10:30 and when the march stewards arrived at 11:30 we went through the route for the plan as well as the obvious health and safety considerations.

Plenty of people were interested in the campaign and were actively signing the hand-written petition and wishing to take up the banners and placards and join the march.

Public support has been amazing and one gentleman borough along a banner that he had made with “Save Our Post Office” written on it that was used as the main banner at the very front during the march. This banner is the one that you will see in the media and everyone involved in the campaign owes that gentleman a great deal of thanks and appreciation for his hard work and efforts.

The local media was in attendance with photographers from the newspapers as well a BBC journalist who expressed an interest in the footage shot by our cameraman whom we will be passing the footage on to later today once we take a copy for editing into small features for use on the campaign website.

The march left the square at 12:30 and moved up pride hill where we had a platform arranged so that campaigners Jon Tandy and Steve Charlton could address the supporters.

Logistically it could have gone very wrong indeed because we had hundreds of people supporting the campaign and essentially blocking pride hill but everything went well following one or two issues with installing the portable PA system and both campaigners and shoppers got into the spirit of things and were shouting their chants of support the campaign which was good.

The only downside was that three youths tried to cause problems and disrupt the march but everyone carried on in a sensible manner and ignored these trouble makers. Crossing from the square to the bottom of pride hill one impatient driver felt the need to try and push people out of the way but luckily none of the campaigners, pedestrians or shoppers were harmed.

After the march the pride hill area was cleared quickly as to avoid disruption for the shoppers and local businesses.

A post-march analysis took place over a cold pint and campaigners Jon and Steve recorded a special feature and thanked everyone who had been involved and who had supported the campaign.

The footage will go to the BBC along with the march footage so it may well appear on television but here at saveourpostoffice.co.uk we will certainly add it to the campaign website when we edit the footage and break it down into smaller sections for easy access.

Overall it was a good day and we believe that we certainly got our voices heard and expressed our outrage at the closure and re-location.

Campaigners are still fighting this and next week Councillor Jon Tandy and MP Daniel Kawczynski will be travelling to London with the 10,000+ signature petition and the printouts of the on-line petition signatures to meet with Alan Leighton (Post office executive) to discuss the plans and to try and come to an arrangement that will allow the towns post office to meet the requirements that the public have expressed during the campaign.

This blog is independent of any political party or organisation

SABC Objection

Save Our Post Office.co.uk — Thu, 27 Jul 2006 13:32:56 +0000

Robin Hooper, writes to the Post Office – 27/07/06

The Chief Executive of the Shrewsbury & Atcham Borough Council, Robin Hooper, has written to the post office, setting out the Council’s opposition to the move.

The text of the letter can be read here

Shrewsbury Council Objects to Proposed Transfer – 27/07/06
Following a debate during a Council meeting on 24th July 2006, Shrewsbury and Atcham Borough Council unanimously adopted the cross party supported motion:

“This Council strongly objects to the proposed transfer of the Main Post Office currently located in St Mary’s Street to another retail outlet within the town.

The proposed new location is considered not to be in the interests of the majority of residents and is being conducted purely for the purpose of financial expediency of Post Office Counters Ltd.

Furthermore this Council deplores the proposed loss of in excess of 200 years experience provided by existing staff some of whom will be relocated therefore enabling other areas out of Shrewsbury to benefit.

This Council therefore calls upon Post Office Counters Ltd to seriously reconsider its’ proposals on relocating to another site and enable the residents of this Borough to continue to have the benefit of the service provided by existing staff.

The retention of “Crown Office” status is an important symbol for Shrewsbury as the County Town of Shropshire and such status should be maintained.

This blog is independent of any political party or organisation

Campaign March

Save Our Post Office.co.uk — Thu, 27 Jul 2006 12:11:07 +0000

Our campaign website has now gone live and the on-line petition is attracting support. We will be updating the website and this blog on a regular basis and we have some more media to add soon.

This coming Saturday campaigners are planning a march through the town starting at 12:15 outside of the Music Hall off the market square and moving up pride hill where campaigners will make a speech.

If you can then we urge you to come along and support the march because the more people protesting, the larger the impact it will have.

This blog is independent of any political party or organisation

Welcome

Save Our Post Office.co.uk — Wed, 26 Jul 2006 15:18:17 +0000

Hello and Welcome to the official blog for the campaign to save Shrewsbury Post Office from closure and re-location to the basement level of the towns WH Smith retail store.

This blog is an important part of the local campaign and will be used in conjunction with the local website to keep people up-to-date and invite interaction and feedback from the community.

Our website will be launching within the next day or so and will be a one stop resource for people wanting to know about the campaign and how to get involved.

There is currently an online petition running in associate with the hand-written petition and a short video feature (Windows Media format) about the campaign with a short interview with Councillor Jon Tandy.

You can join our letter writing campaign by downloading the two page letter, signing it and posting it to:

Byron Roberts
Programme Director
Post Office Ltd, c/o National Consultation Team
PO Box 2060
WATFORD
WD18 8ZW

You can download the letter in the three formats:

Campaign Letter – ODT (Open Office)

Campaign Letter – Doc (MS Word)

Campaign Letter – PDF (Adobe Acrobat)

There will be regular updates on here and on the official campaign website so bookmark our website and blog and tell you friends about our campaign.

This blog is independent of any political party or organisation