THIRTY one sub-post offices in Leigh, Atherton and Tyldesley are threatened with closure under plans for switching welfare payments to banks.

They are among an estimated 8,000 nationwide under threat because they depend on Benefit Agency transactions for a substantial part of their income.

In the Leigh Parliamentary constituency, 15 of the 18 sub-post offices get 40% or more of their income from cashing benefits.

In Makerfield Constituency, 16 of the 21 sub-post offices could be affected.

Now a top local postmaster is urging pensioners and young mums to voice support for keeping open local offices.

"If they leave this alone they will be doing themselves a horrible, horrible dis-service," said NW national executive officer Hugh Jones from Tyldesley.

The Government is encouraging claimants to have the benefits money paid into bank accounts, removing vital business from the post offices. Changes to the way child benefits are paid were recently annouced by the DSS.

They informed 370,000 recipients that payments would be made monthly rather than weekly and encouraged them to have money paid into bank accounts.

This has reinforced suspicions that the Benefits Agency hopes to save millions of pounds in administrative costs by switching to automatic bank transfers.

The closure implications are revealed in DTI figures.

Converted for the new archive on 14 July 2000. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.