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Booze to celebrate return of its post
Exclusive POSTAL services to a remote Yorkshire Dales community are due to resume next month after minor road improvements have placated the Royal Mail's health and safety concerns.
The Yorkshire Post exclusively revealed that deliveries to the isolated hamlet of Booze were to be abandoned after a health and safety inspection deemed postal workers faced an "unacceptable" risk of back injuries while trying to negotiate the country lane.
The decision to suspend the services was condemned by affected householders and local politicians amid concerns that other isolated villages could fall victim to the health and safety bureaucracy.
The Royal Mail also faced strong criticism after it had not consulted with residents and only sent a letter giving them 24 hours notice.
But it emerged yesterday that deliveries to the tiny settlement, near Reeth, are due to start in September after North Yorkshire County Council agreed to carry out minor improvements to the mile-long lane to the hamlet.
Hazel Harker, whose family have been farming in Booze since 1945, has had to collect her mail from a friend's house after deliveries were stopped two-and-a-half weeks ago.
She said: "It seems as though common sense has prevailed... A mail service is something you expect in the 21st century, and we felt that we were being cut off from the wider world."
A total of 11 households in Booze are due to have their mail deliveries start up again, although another eight properties elsewhere in Arkengarthdale are still expected to be left without services.
The county council's improvements are due to be carried out during the next fortnight to improve passing places on the lane into Booze. However, the work will not take in the private tracks up to these other eight properties, meaning that the Royal Mail's health and safety concerns will still remain.
A Royal Mail spokeswoman said: "We will recommence deliveries once we are satisfied there are no other health and safety risks to our deliverystaff."
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Weather for Yorkshire
Saturday 26 May 2012
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Sunny
Temperature: 9 C to 21 C
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Temperature: 9 C to 22 C
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