"Bad elements" from Aberdeen take a trip to Banchory ...

... and are alleged to have got up to no good in the post office there.

More post offices in Scotland scheduled for closure

Those affected in this round of post office closures are in north-east Scotland; more than 40 post offices, mostly rural, from Forres in Moray to Lochgelly in Fife are affected.

My attitude toward an earlier round of closures in Highland Region was somewhat ambivalent; I recognised the difficulty some people ('service users' in the jargon) would have after the closures took effect, but on the other hand most of the affected branches were relying on a very small number of customers, and even if the potential numbers of customers were greater, many of those potential customers had never been over the thresh-hold of these post offices in many years so it was difficult to understand how their objections to the closures could plausibly be entertained.

That remains my basic attitude, but there probably comes a point where the continuing closures will fuel an increasing downward spiral as more and more people no longer even have the possibility of using a local post office; the remaining network might well become increasingly irrelevant, particularly as many of the transactions previously channeled through post offices have been diverted elsewhere so that the remaining purely 'post office' business is no longer sufficient to help support the other business such post offices transact. I am not entirely sure where I am going with this, but the continuing rounds of post office closures do, more and more, begin to resemble 'slash and burn'. If this continues, will any but major city centre post offices exist in 15 or 20 years time?

The cabinet either believe some post offices need to be closed ...

... or they don't.

However it seems some cabinet ministers, upto seven present and former members of the cabinet according to this report, appear in two minds about the issue. Or, 'two-faced', if you like, by campaigning simultaneously to 'represent' (allegedly) their constituents' views and going along with the cabinet's decision to back the closure of a very significant number of post offices.

I expect it's simply a case of economic realities coming face to face with electoral opportunism - these cabinet ministers, however 'high and mighty' they may be whilst they benefit from the ministerial car and the higher 'perks' (an even higher remuneration package than that received by common or garden MPs), must still go through the ritual of getting re-elected a minimum of once every five years. I think that it is in this context that one needs to view certain cabinet ministers' divided loyalties - although quite how a constituency MP can campaign for the government (of which he/she is a cabinet member) to change a government policy is one perhaps for a psychiatrist rather than a mere blogger!

PS/ I have no particular view one way or the other on the post office closure debate. I tend to think that the closure of some post offices is justified on the grounds of cost - although the reasons for this situation having arisen (removal of certain revenue-earning services which post offices used to provide, for reasons of efficiency allegedly) is perhaps less clearcut. For a much less equivocal view on this matter, visit A Gurn from Nurn where Graisg has recently been campaigning against the closure of Nairn's Harbour Street post office.

PPS/ This blog has been silent for the past week as I have had my first official guests at my new place in Spain - they left earlier this week, after a very enjoyable interlude (for all of us, I think) so I should now be able to get back to semi-regular blogging again.