Neil Thomas visits a community on the Shropshire/Wales border where the villagers are fighting to keep their post office open.
In 1889 the village of Llanwddyn near the Shropshire/Mid Wales border was wiped from the landscape.
Homes, the school, post office, two pubs, hotel and church disappeared beneath Lake Vrynwy, flooded when a dam was built to provide water for the burgeoning city of Liverpool 60 miles away.
Eerily, when water levels fall, you can glimpse the spire of the old stone church, a ghostly sight shimmering below the surface of the lake.
A new village was built beside the lake and the massive excavation that cost people their original homes ironically provided work, firstly with Liverpool Corporation’s Water Board and, latterly, with Severn Trent Water.
Hundreds of trees were planted around the lake and, at one time, 100 were employed by the Forestry Commission though that has dwindled to a handful.
A new village grew, but Llanwddyn, like many small communities, seems forever to be at the mercy of remote figures of authority.
In the Victorian era it was politicians in Westminster, passing the Bill that allowed the villagers’ homes to be engulfed and no more.
Today, nearly 120 years later, Llanwddyn is in danger of fragmenting again. The school, surely a sign of faith in the future of a community, is under threat of closure.
Now the post office is facing the axe.
The village, which has a population of around 300, is not taking it lying down. Campaigners have come up with an innovative idea to keep primary education in the village by merging with the similarly under-threat Llanfihangel School on the site in Llanwddyn, under the auspices of the Church of Wales.
Likewise, villagers have pledged to fight to keep their post office counter, part of a consultation on closure with many others in the country under national streamlining proposals.
Llanwddyn has already seen one post office “drowned” and its full-time replacement closed down during cuts in the 1990s.
A post office was retained then through the efforts of Audrey Jones, who offered to run the service, which she has done for the past 14 years.
The post office is open every Monday and Thursday at the community centre, next to the school.
Audrey says she does brisk business and there are no sound financial reasons for taking away the service. She had a small queue on the day I wandered in to take a look.
“I’m usually pretty busy. I do everything here except passports and motor tax. People can cash cheques here. The chap I’ve just served did £11 worth of business alone,” she says.
Helping business to flourish is the fact that socialising has grown up around the post office opening hours of 8.30am to 4pm.
The hatch to Audrey’s office opens out on to a refreshments bar where coffee mornings and charity fundraisers are held. This is truly a community service - there must be nearly 30 people there when I walk in.
“If the post office were to close, we would lose a lot with it besides,” says Audrey.
“People like to come in, enjoy a cup of coffee and a chat and buy their stamps or cash their pensions.”
Charities would lose out, too. There are cards on sale to raise money for Hope House children’s hospice at Oswestry, soft toys for sale to raise cash for the Air Ambulance and other products bringing in money for the likes of multiple sclerosis research, leukaemia research and Macmillan Cancer Relief.
A DVD called The Changing Valley, telling the story behind the flooding of the village, is on sale at £9.50 (£10 mail order) to raise funds for the local St Wddyn Parochial Church Council.
Llanwddyn’s remoteness makes the potential closure of services like the school or post office a major concern.
“If the school closes the children face a journey of six miles every day on terrible roads which can be quite dangerous in winter,” says David Rowlands, community centre president.
The nearest post office, meanwhile, is 10 miles away in the town of Llanfyllin. Okay, if you have a car. However, several Llanwddyn residents don’t and they have to use the occasional bus service.
“If you want to use the bus you have to remember to phone to book it the day before,” explains widow Margaret Jandrell.
Once in Llanfyllin you can link up with the main bus service to use the wider services on offer in Oswestry, a further 12 miles away.
“Three or four years ago we had a bus service here but that was stopped and now what we have is run by Dial-a-Ride,” she says.
Should Llanwddyn post office close, something as simple as buying a set of stamps or collecting your pension looks like being a right old rigmarole if you are in your 70s and without car.
“I wonder if these people at the top would want their elderly mothers to travel a 20-mile round trip to pick up their pensions?” asks 66 year-old Margaret Hughes.
“They are spoiling the rural areas.”
Audrey Jones is left slightly dumbfounded by the logic of closing rural post offices to save money while spending millions on television advertising, with stars like Westlife and Wendy Richard, urging people to use the service.
Audrey also points to another area of questionable logic.
“The Government are always telling us to cut down on using our cars because of the environment, yet closing village post offices will force people to drive.”
Audrey accepts the harsh realities of the business world dictate that losing money puts you under threat. But she believes she is running a thriving business and closing it would make no economic sense.
Furthermore, it’s an award-winning business, lifting the Best Community Post Office regional title and a £500 prize at a grand awards ceremony at the Botanical Gardens in Birmingham seven years ago.
She is enlisting the support of the Postmasters’ Association in her fight to keep operating while other members of the community are planning a petition.
While it is convenient to have a counter on hand two days a week, the post office in Llanwddyn is clearly so much more than that to the villagers. One after another, in different words, they express to me essentially the same sentiment - that for so many of them the facility is a hub of village life.
“Since my husband died of cancer I have been on my own and I would miss the socialising at the post office. I don’t drive and it is important to me to have it here,” says 69 year-old Margaret Jandrell.
“We do need our post office. It’s the only showcase we have for so many things in the village,” adds Jen Barrett.
“And the cost of running this service must be a fraction of the cost of running a main post office.”
John Shorey adds: “We need to fight to keep it open because once it’s gone, it’s gone. It will ruin the place.”
Margaret Hughes says: “We have never been without a post office here but the caring seems to be going out of modern life. Audrey reminds you how services used to be. She is very conscientious, she helps a lot of people with forms. She has time for people.”
Several point out the potential for custom offered by the area’s appeal to tourists, who arrive in their thousands for the relaxing lakeside walks and amenities and to see the spectacular dam. The village has two caravan parks and the Lake Vrynwy Hotel as well as a shop, cafe and Royal Society for the Protection of Birds visitor centre.
Others I speak to, including Annette Griffiths, Heather Knowles and Iris Pugh, express many of the same sentiments as those above.
David Rowlands believes Llanwddyn must argue the post office’s success as a business, that it deserves to remain for commercial reasons, rather than rely on sentiment.
“We are not unique. Many village post offices face the same fight. As a general tendency the Government does not care too much about rural areas. We must show our post office deserves to stay open on merit, which it does.”
One thing is for sure, the descendants of the sunk Victorian village of Llanwddyn are in no mood to see their post office disappear again . . . this time for good.
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