Bedworth angry over gold postbox 'snub'

[dutchman]

Angry Bedworth residents are bombarding the Royal Mail with letters and e-mails because they think Nick Skelton's gold postbox should be in their town and not Alcester.


The Mayor of Alcester, Lennox Cumberbatch alongside the gold post box in High Street.

Despite the fact the 54-year-old showjumper chose where to have his postbox, Bedworth is united in anger because Skelton was born in the North Warwickshire town.

Residents claim the Royal Mail have “snubbed” them and taken the shine off “their” Olympic gold, and a campaign has been launched to get one of their own postboxes repainted.

Last week, a postbox on Alcester’s High Street was painted gold after Skelton - who lives in Shelfied, a small village north of the town - won gold in the Equestrian Team showjumping. The Royal Mail are giving one postbox a golden paintjob in every home town of British winners at the Olympic and Paralympic Games.

Around 800 people are members of a Facebook campaign titled “Bedworth should get a golden postbox because of Nick Skelton’s gold win," and the Mayor of Nuneaton and Bedworth, John Haynes, said: “He [Skelton] is a Bedworth bloke and I knew of him when he was a lad.”

The showjumper only lived in Bedworth until he was 13 or 14 years old, moving away some 40 years ago, and although there is a chemist in the town called Skelton’s, this has not been owned by the family for some years.

According to the local newspaper, the Nuneaton News, Bedworth townsfolk are “furious” with the Royal Mail.

However, in a letter from the Royal Mail to a campaigning Bedworth resident, a Royal Mail spokesperson said: “We painted that postbox [in Alcester] at the request of Nick’s office.”

This answer is not enough for some though, who have threatened to glam up a Bedworth postbox without the Royal Mail’s consent, which, by the strict letter of the law, would be vandalism.

Police recently arrested a 51-year-old man for doing just that in Lymington, where Ben Ainslie lives. The golden postbox in honour of the British sailor was painted in Cornwall, where he grew up.

Bedworth obviously feel Skelton belongs to them. There is currently an exhibition that chronicles his glittering career at the Bedworth Heritage Centre; the Nuneaton News ran an article headlined “They’ve nicked our gold”; and in an ongoing poll on the paper’s website, 79 per cent of people said Bedworth should have a gold postbox.

Skelton’s gold was both long-overdue and remarkable. Competing in his sixth Olympics, the man who has been at the top of the sport for over three decades had never even won a medal.

Just to get to London 2012 he had to recover from a broken neck in 2000, and following a hip replacement last year, the patched-up jumper has to undergo back surgery later this year.

A Royal Mail spokesperson said: "Should Nick request us to paint a post box in Bedworth we would of course do so."

[dutchman]

Bedworth wins gold postbox to honour Nick Skelton

A postbox is to be painted gold in the Warwickshire birthplace of showjumper Nick Skelton.

It follows a campaign by more than 800 people to have his Olympic gold medal achievement recognised in his hometown of Bedworth.

A postbox was painted in High Street, Alcester, where Nick Skelton now lives, after he and Team GB won a gold medal in the team showjumping event.

The mayor of Nuneaton and Bedworth said it would be the box by the Civic Hall.

Councillor John Haynes said: "I think Nick's been getting on to the post office, saying "my friends in Bedworth are being hard done by".

"He's persuaded them, I'm sure, to paint the one outside the Civic Hall gold."

Residents in Norfolk are also asking for a postbox to be painted gold in honour of his horse Big Star, who is stabled in Holt.