Coming together

This is already happening in North Newbald where a post office has opened at the village school. Now residents in Foston, who lost postal services 12 years ago, can purchase stamps after a disused outdoor toilet at the school was converted into a small shop.

To some, this may not sound significant. But that misses the point. As well as helping teach important skills to those pupils who help sell stamps, this initiative – and others – helps raise awareness about the importance of local services, their viability and the benefits if communities can become more self-reliant.

It is very easy to be critical of the powers-that-be when they cut key services on cost grounds. It is more difficult to devise a credible alternative. And, as such, the proactive pupils in Foston, and elsewhere, deserve to be congratulated for showing what can be achieved when communities feel both empowered and emboldened. If they can do it, so can others.