A severely disabled Hastings woman has won the go-ahead to mount a full High Court test case battle against the widespread closure of local post offices, which she says threatens among other things the only post office she can get to.
She claims the closures breach of laws for the disabled.
Judy Brown, of Rock-A-Nore Road, Hastings, who is described in court documents as elderly and severely disabled, uses Hastings Old Town post office twice a week on behalf of her and her ver
y elderly, and also seriously disabled, mother, for banking, bill payments, shopping, letter writing and sending presents to grandchildren.
She says it is the only post office she can visit, but that the threat of closure hangs over it following the decision of the Royal Mail to shut down hundreds of post offices across the country.
Three such closures have already been announced, with decisions about a further eight post offices in the town still awaited – one of them the Old Town branch that she says is also used by a number of other elderly and disabled residents.
Now she has won the go-ahead for a full High Court hearing in which she will challenge the decision by business secretary John Hutton, who is overseeing the decision to close some 2,500 post offices, to exempt the Royal Mail from the 2006 Disability Equality Duty ( DED).
Today Mr Justice Nigel Davis ruled that she had an "arguable" case, and that the matter should proceed to a full hearing.
The judge said: "I suspect that very few people would want to see local post offices closing. They can form an important part in the social fabric of life."
However, he continued: "Whether it is desirable or not for them to close is not the sole question, for many people must recognise that something ha to be done when the Post Office system is losing £4million a week."
When the full hearing takes place Mrs Brown will claim that the exemption in effect takes the interests of the disabled out of the equation when working out which post offices to close,, and therefore discriminated against her and others in her position.
She claims that the decision is both irrational and unlawful.
Publicly funded Mrs Brown seeks a High Court declaration that, before closing any more post offices, the authorities take into account the rights of the disabled.
Lawyers for the Government and the Royal Mail maintain that the decision to close post offices was entirely compatible with the Disabled Customer Policy and the law.
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