By Tim Murgatroyd

Is it just me who wonders if there has been a series of alien abductions in York?

I’m not referring to little green men with outlandishly large ray guns hoovering up the citizens of our fair city and whisking them off in giant space ships for painful experiments. I was actually thinking of powers closer to home.

Firstly, where have all our post offices gone? Anyone of a certain age will remember a time when post offices were everywhere. In my own corner of York there were several within a five minute walk until fairly recently. Whoosh! They have vanished. And it seems more are to follow.

According to a recent article in The Press (Petition plea for new post office, March 23), Crichton Avenue Post Office in Clifton has recently closed due to its manager complaining of absurd workloads and defective equipment because of under-investment.

This leaves the residents of my corner of the city with a trudge of well over a mile to either Rawcliffe or Lendal for their nearest post office counter. For those who are elderly, disabled or without transport that might well prove a mile too far.

Nor is this only a local problem. Nationally, hundreds of branch closures have occurred since 2010.

So what, you might say, who needs such old-fashioned places? But for generations the local post office has served as a community hub in an age where many feel communities are breaking down. If nothing else it offers easy access to pensions and paying bills: a lifeline for many people.

York Press:

Counter attack: Wendy Martin at Crichton Avenue post office, which recently closed

Post office branches have served us well and should not be allowed to wither away following privatisation. Not everything in this world should be about making a fat profit for shareholders or the dreaded ‘bottom line’ that so often feels a euphemism for low pay, redundancies and excessive workloads.

There have been other alien abductions, of late, in York. For one thing it seems increasingly hard to find a bin for your sandwich wrapper or coffee cup in the city centre.

This may seem a small issue. But it seems to me a harbinger of public spending cuts to come in our austerity-plagued times. And you see the signs everywhere if you look hard enough.

For example, police officers seem to have been largely replaced by street rangers in the city centre. Now I am not denigrating these mainly youthful individuals ranging from Piccadilly to Parliament Street. It’s just that I would prefer to have properly trained and accountable police officers protecting my city.

But as with post offices, this is a national problem. According to a report by the police watchdog, Her Majesty’s Inspectorate of Constabulary (HMIC), forces are coping with austerity budget cuts sometimes higher than 20 per cent.

The consequences are predictable to anyone who has ever had to manage a massive reduction in their household income. Vital things go. In this case, HMIC has reported “dangerous” and “disturbing” practices that threaten to put citizens at risk.

Examples include reclassifying emergency calls, including high-risk domestic abuse victims, in order to justify slower response times and not enough frontline officers to investigate crimes. Not to mention a shortage of skilled detectives amounting to a ‘national crisis’.

Such alien abductions of resources for essential services tears worrying holes in the safety nets we rely on and pay our taxes to maintain.

Only last week the Fire Brigades Union complained that cuts in the North Yorkshire fire service will lead to 48 frontline fire fighter posts being axed. In addition, a standard fire engine is to be replaced with a ‘tactical response’ ‘miniature’ vehicle manned by reduced crews.

Is it just me who regards such Government cuts as reckless? The first duty of any democratic government is to keep its citizens safe.

Playing with fire is a dangerous game, as anyone sensible knows. Personally, I find it incomprehensible we can afford corporate tax reductions and low taxes for the wealthy when our emergency services are being whittled away by public spending cuts. We should remember that every cut can be healed with goodwill and long term investment.