SO — after literally hundreds of responses from across the Highlands — the consultation exercise over 28 proposed post office closures has now reached its end.
Right across the whole of Ross and Cromarty, not a single change is to be made to the original plans.
Just from a very small sample of consultation responses which were copied to my office in Dingwall, I know the huge range of personal perspectives with which post office bosses were inundated at the start of the year. Individuals and groups took time to campaign, to attend public meetings and to compile information to inform Post Office Ltd's plans.
Their efforts now appear to have fallen on deaf and unresponsive ears. One isolated concession in Caithness looks a lot like tokenism when taken with the very serious questions which have been left unaddressed.
No two post offices are the same, but so many remain right at the heart of Highland communities, from Contin to Saltburn, Rosemarkie and Maryburgh. In Dingwall itself, the post office earmarked for closure is of huge importance to many of its older and less mobile customers, who will now face real difficulty accessing the nearest alternative, itself a busy branch. There will be understandable concern for businesses in the vicinity of the West End Branch, which benefit from the 'footfall' which post office services attract, although I know local people will make an effort to support them.
Neither the volume nor the quality of information supplied to Post Office Ltd on any of these points can be faulted. Regrettably, much good work — by communities, by the council and by others besides — has been wasted on an essentially cosmetic consultation.
That is something about which Post Office Ltd bosses should feel ashamed. A flawed and inflexible process has yielded only error, opaqueness and an unsatisfactory outcome. Gordon Brown's Government bears a large part of the responsibility for ordering the closures, but Post Office Ltd itself is playing a dangerous game.
The need for a positive political commitment to our post office network has never been greater, but Labour Ministers still refuse to act. By working with them to erode its greatest assets — its community-based, human-faced branches and the unique relationship they have with their customers — the post office is not doing itself any favours at all.
I will keep working to make sure that a viable post office network is not just able to survive, but to succeed.
IT WOULD not be appropriate to let this opportunity pass without reflecting briefly on last week's political news – the return of Europe to the centre stage of British politics. The Lisbon Treaty gave rise to strong passions in the House of Commons even while it passed much of the country by. It simply is not the constitution that was once proposed – it is modest by comparison, and leaves all previous treaties basically in place.
Even so, I have long argued – right back to the Tories' refusal to hold a referendum over the much more ambitious changes made under the Maastricht Treaty over 15 years ago – that a further public vote should be held to settle the question of our involvement with the modern EU once and for all.
The vote which the Conservatives called for last week could not achieve that because it would have left the bigger question entirely unaddressed.
I regret that the Labour and Tory Parties co-operated to prevent the real referendum on Europe being discussed by Parliament, still less agreed to. Even so, I believe it will come.
When it does, I look forward to campaigning to highlight the big positives which Europe has brought to our country – and to the Highlands in particular. The EU is not perfect, but we can and should have a reforming role at its heart making it more liberal, open and accountable.
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