Postal deliveries in Watford will not be affected by Royal Mail's £2billion modernisation plans, a union leader has said.

The postal company has put forward proposals to close the sorting office in Ascot Road, open a new delivery office somewhere in the town and move processing operations to Hemel Hempstead.

But Trevor Flowers, chairman of the Watford branch of the Communication Workers Union, said he did not expect these changes to affect deliveries to residential homes and offices.

He told the Watford Observer today (Thursday) that proposals were put forward by the union to retain the current sorting office.

However, these were rejected as “not viable” in favour of Royal Mail's preferred option to move the processing operations to Hemel Hempstead and open a new delivery and collections office somewhere in Watford.

“That seems to be what they will go with but there's no firm decision until November,” Mr Flowers said.

“There's more negotiating to do but I think that's what will happen. Our emphasis now is on what happens to our members - what choices do they get? - and we're also keen to make sure the service to the public is maintained.

“It probably will be but the proposals put in, I think, are purely for financial reasons.”

A service transformation agreement signed by Royal Mail and the union forewarned the possibility of relocating staff and closing offices.

However, a subsequent contract signed last year ensured there would be no compulsory redundancies.

Royal Mail said there were likely to be about 300 job losses across Hertfordshire as part of the company's modernisation programme.

Mr Flowers said: “Some people drive, some don't. Some live in Watford. There's all these things to be sorted but I don't see it making a major difference to the processing side of things [if it moves to Hemel Hempstead].

“What we're concerned with is collections and deliveries because they haven't said where they're going to site the office. All they've said is it will be in Watford.”