What's next in the Post Office campaign?

More than 60 readers turned up to the Post Office closures debate at Birmingham Council Chamber last week.

Councillors Nigel Dawkins (Tory) and Ayoub Khan (Lib Dem) spoke up with Prof Carl Chinn (passionately)against Post Office closures, while Mike Dalton and Mark Partington from the Post Office played the 'Yes, Minister' role of 'we're only doing what the government tells us to do'.

Sadly, in my opinion, former Labour doyen Najma Hafeez of the Postwatch 'watchdog' did a poor job of sticking up for the public's opinion. It felt like she was a stooge, insisting she was all for local needs and opinions, but in reality supporting the closure programme.

Two things struck me in particular:

1/ The real vulnerability of many of the public who are outraged at the closures... I watched the agonising progress of some of the elderly and disabled as they struggled up the Council House stairs to the debating chamber. These closures will really hurt those most in need (in all the pictures we've taken of campaigners outside the dozens of Posts Offices under threat, there always seems to be several frail OAPs and one or two severely disabled in mobility cars... who's caring for their needs?)

2/ The fact that ALL the public felt the consultation was a real farce. "Will this change anything?" was a repeated question. "No, not really," was the actual answer, however camouflaged the Post Office and Najma tried to make it.

So what's next?

Well, signatures on the Mail's petition now number more than 6,000. This demands that the Government "calls an immediate halt to the current mass Post Office closure programme to allow for real consultation with local community leaders and councillors to take place on an individual area basis before any action".

We want the consequences of such action on vulnerable people to be fully considered. We want to make sure that our local neighbourhoods, some already fragile enough, are not further fractured by insensitive programmes of branch closures and local redundancies.

And we'll take this unashamed challenge - along with some of the furious campaigners - to Number 10 on Monday July 28.