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Central London post offices threatened with closure could be relocated in council buildings such as libraries under plans unveiled today.

Westminster council says it wants to stop the “catastrophe” of post offices disappearing and “ripping the heart” out of communities. It has held talks with Royal Mail bosses.

It believes it can make loss-making branches financially viable by allowing them to handle some council services, such as rent collection, or move into council buildings such as libraries or “one-stop shop” advice centres.

In Westminster one major Crown post office, the Harrow Road branch, is under threat of closure and another, in Poland Street, Soho, is moving into a WH Smith half a mile away in Oxford Street.

Since 2003, six post offices have shut in the borough and four more could be axed under a national closure programme unveiled in May.

Tony Devenish, who chairs Westminster’s post office taskforce, said: “While we understand post offices need to be able to sustain themselves financially, it would be a catastrophe for our most vulnerable residents if the vital service were to disappear. If post office counters can be set up within WH Smith, there is no reason why they couldn’t do the same inside council-run facilities.” However, he said talks were at an early stage.

Royal Mail is planning to axe about 150 post offices across London over two years as part of its plan to stem the network’s £200 million-a-year losses. In 2002 there were 1,200 branches. By next year there will be about 750.

A petition to save the Harrow Road branch has been signed by 4,000 residents.

A Royal Mail spokesman said: “The Post Office is working to establish the future for the branch, including exploring the option of working with a partner.”

Alan Cook is happiest when confronting a crisis. So as managing director of Post Office Limited, it seems he has found the perfect job as he sets about axeing 2,500 branches between now and November next year against a backdrop of increasing public anger.

Cook, 53, is known as ‘Mr Fixit’ and was brought in 16 months ago by Royal Mail chairman Allan Leighton and paid GBP 250,000 a year to plug losses of GBP 4 million a week, with the promise of a large bonus if he could rescue the sinking business.

‘I like fixing things, fixing businesses,’ he says. ‘I’m at my best when I go in somewhere and things are looking desperate. Then after a while employees start saying “good – things are changing for the better”.

I like that.’ But that is the opposite of what many disheartened employees are saying about the new hard-sell approach.

Since Cook came on board, the Post Office has shifted more than 550,000 financial products – everything from car cover to travel insurance.
As Financial Mail reported last week, many staff say the aggressive selling to customers risks damaging the Post Office’s trusted brand.

Cook counters by saying that a more businesslike approach is essential for survival.

Fixing, axeing, whatever you want to call it, certainly dominates his CV, especially in the latter half of his career. In the early Nineties, towards the last third of a commendably loyal 31 years at Prudential, which involved stints in most parts of the business, he was responsible as head of general insurance operations for cutting 26 administrative centres to five, with the loss of 2,000 jobs.