Locals fight for postal services

A service from Pembroke will operate as an outreach service

Residents of a village in Pembrokeshire are campaigning to save their post office following the resignation of the current postmistress.

Lawrenny Post Office is due to be closed at the end of the month.

Locals have said they were not consulted on the closure which is the focal point of the village.

The Post Office said it was reviewing the service and was providing a new home service for the area which will start on 6 December.

A spokesperson said around 15 customers a week used the Lawrenny site and said a "home service was probably a better option".

'Not acceptable'

But locals are unconvinced and intend to lobbying politicians including Labour MP for Carmarthen West and South Pembrokeshire, Nick Ainger and the Leader of the Conservatives in the Welsh assembly, Nick Borne.

After the current sub-mistress tendered her resignation at the end of October, another residents Marijke McBean was ready to take over.

She runs the village youth hostel and said a number of businesses operate locally and rely on the post office, including a mail order cake business, a film production company, a boat building business.

She said the home service would not an acceptable option as it would mean a weekly visit.

The home service was introduced to allow essential services to be maintained in remote rural areas and it does not rely on having a physical branch in the village.

Tony Jones, Post Office Ltd's Network development manager said: "Under such a review for Lawrenny, where the volume of business handled has unfortunately reduced over the years, it now actually warrants a significantly reduced face-to-face serving time from the present eight hours per week."

He added the home service was "more efficient and cost effective in terms of the whole network and helps to sustain the branch at Pembroke".

The new service will operate as an outreach service from the Pembroke branch.

It already provides services to the villages of St Florence, Castlemartin, Hundleton and Angle in Pembrokeshire.