Wednesday August 28th 2024
Written by Local Democracy Reporter, Paul Kelly
An urgent motion will come before Scottish Borders Council this week calling on the Post Office to invest in counter services in rural communities.
The Post Office was given £640m of taxpayers money to help support a network transformation over a 10 year period, with that process set to end in 2025.
As part of the transformation process the Post Office agreed funding to support the costs of putting a new Post Office counter in when there is a reconfiguration of service.
There is concern that the Post Office may no longer be committed to covering this transformation cost and that this may deter potential new sub-postmasters from taking over contracts from retiring sub-postmasters.
In a motion to full council on Thursday, August 29, Lib Dem councillor Drummond Begg, who represents Tweeddale West, says it is understood there are currently 30 post offices UK wide that should benefit from this fund in advance of the April 2025 deadline.
He say: “This may in turn lead to avoidable closures of a rural Post Office with a significantly lesser ‘statutory service’ being provided once a week by van.
“We propose that the council leader write to the chair and chief executive of the Post Office asking them to commit to support the ongoing funding of transformation of existing Post Office counters until the end of the agreed network transformation period in 2025.”
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