Pressure ramps up to save Tipperary's rural post offices as campaign groups formed

Campaign committees have been set up in the past week to fight the permanent closure of post offices in five Tipp communities under the controversial voluntary retirement scheme for rural post masters. 

Save our post office action committees were formed at public meetings in Clogheen, and Ballingarry last week and a joint committee covering the three Mid-Tipp communities of Littleton, Templetuohy and Gortnahoe was formed at a public meeting in Littleton on Monday night.

There was a large turnout of concerned residents as well as local councillors and TDs at all three public meetings. 

Ballingarry FF Cllr Imelda Goldsboro estimated about 100 people attended the public meeting in Ballingarry Community Hall last Thursday night at which the Save Ballingarry Community Post Office Committee was formed.

The Ballingarry meeting was addressed by Limerick City based post master Tom O'Callaghan, who chairs the Independent Post Masters Group that is campaigning for the post office network to diversify to a community banking system similar to the Kiwibank model in New Zealand.  Mr O'Callaghan and local politicians  are pictured above with a framed copy of a motion passed by 158 members of the Dail last year calling for post offices to get new services including community banking.    

Cllr Goldsboro said there was a lot of feedback at the meeting, particularly elderly residents, highlighting their fears of rural isolation and the negative social impact of the post office closure on the community. 

The knock-on economic impact of losing the post office on other shops and businesses in Ballingarry was also highlighted. 

"If 200 people are picking up their pension at the post office on a Friday every week, they are going to spend money in the local shop.  If you calculate what that amounts to over a year, it's very significant,”  Cllr Goldsboro pointed out. 

She said the Save Ballingarry Post Office Committee will hold its first meeting early next week to draw up a plan of action. One ray of hope for the Ballingarry group is the commitment An Post has given that communities with populations of more than 500 will have a post office. 

Cllr Goldsboro points out that according to the 2016 Census more than 1600 people live in Ballingarry. "It's a very large parish. We used to have post offices in Coalbrook and The Commons and they are gone."  

She fears An Post will confine the 500 population criteria to residents living in a village. If that is the case, it's very unfair, she declared.  

The committee formed at the public meeting in Clogheen Community Hall on Tuesday, August 7 is also focusing its campaign on the fact Clogheen has a significant population. 

Local FG Cllr Marie Murphy, who is on the committee, said there are 776 people in Clogheen and its rural district on the Electoral Register and the population of the village is close to 500 if not more. She  is trying to clarify with An Post how it is defining communities with populations of 500 and more. 

She also argues that Clogheen's Post Office provides "enhanced" services to customers, namely AIB banking services. 

She points out the village lost its long standing bank a few years ago and the closure of the post office will mean Clogheen will lose all its banking services. 

Alongside these factors, Cllr Murphy says  a shopowner in Clogheen expressed an interest at the public meeting in taking over the village's post office service when the current post mistress retires. 

Cllr Murphy  has been in phone and email contact with officials in An Post over the past week pressing the case for Clogheen to secure a new post office contract. 

Fianna Fail TD Jackie Cahill, who attended all three public meetings, pointed out that Littleton, Templetuohy, Gorthahoe and Ballingarry were all geographically close to each other.  He believes the loss of post offices in these four communities and in Clogheen will weaken their economic viability. 

He compared the economic viabilities of rural villages to a three legged stool. Losing one of the legs , namely the shop, pub or post office, was the beginning of the end for that village, he declared. 

Deputy Cahill said the Minister for Communications should now intervene and direct An Post to stop these post office closures.