Post Offices: Glenda's Great Betrayal

Wednesday night (March 19) marked the great betrayal of Swiss Cottage residents, not to mention the rest of Hampstead and Highgate, by our own MP Glenda Jackson. On Wednesday she was handed the opportunity to vote against the government, whom she has happily voted and spoken out against in the past, and their planned closure of thousands of local post offices across the country and she flatly rejected it, choosing to toe the government line instead. Ironically, it took a Tory Early Day Motion to present her with this opportunity in spite of their own pitiful record on public services, not to mention the failure of their leader to even turn up for the vote itself. The motion was wholeheartedly supported by the Lib Dems, who themselves have been vigorously campaigning on behalf of their own constituents to save their post offices for years. Although our Glenda showed some promise at the start, speaking against the closures during the debate, in the end admitting that the Tories and Lib Dems actually had a point was evidently just too much to bear and therefore the price of representing her own constituents to Parliament too high to pay. She voted against.

The closure of our local post offices by the government is an issue that has resonated throughout the community, particularly its most vulnerable members, since the policy was originally revealed. The government has promised alternative, mobile post offices, that paint a ghastly picture of a cross between a red pillar box and an ice cream van, within a vicinity of no more than 2 or 3 miles. 2 or 3 miles? Now picture an elderly man, widowed, children live far away, lives alone whose only friends are his own age who find it just as difficult as he to move around without pain and discomfort, without running out of breath every few steps. The only time he gets out of his small house that he bought 50 years ago, and is now in a perpetual state of disrepair, the only time he gets to see the few friends he has left is when he goes to his local post office to pick up his pension. In my area, this is the Finchley Road Post Office. There were more, but they've already been closed. The Finchley Road is a busy main road and a hilly one at that. The Post Office therefore is not easy to get to if you have mobility problems. Nonetheless, there are several small shops and cosy cafes further down the road where local members of the elderly community can frequently be found enjoying a cup of tea and each other's company.

Now consider the case of our friend again; that this small, but quaint, local building is his lifeline. It provides him with his sole source of income, lest he be forced to sell his home, and his only point of contact with the outside world - if you discount the care workers upon whom he relies to help him cook, clean and get in and out of the shower. He is being asked to walk 2 or 3 miles. Apply the same scenario to a pregnant woman or someone in a wheelchair and you see where I'm going with this.

Luckily, we live in a democracy where we can show MPs such as Glenda Jackson what happens to Parliamentarians who take their constituents for granted and who choose to be on the winning side over being on the right side. And although this battle may be lost, there are plenty more to come and as long as we pick someone to represent us who we can trust will actually take our side, our fortunes can only improve.