BT's £1 offer on phone box

A Shropshire town council is the first in the county to be offered the chance to "adopt" a red phone box for the bargain price of £1.

However, Church Stretton Town Council would have to find £500 a year to ensure the phone box in All Stretton remains functional.

BT is allowing local councils to "adopt" the telephone boxes in a bid to save them from disappearing from the British countryside altogether.

Over the past few years the telecoms giant has seen a massive drop in the number of people using public phone boxes due to an increase in the use of mobile phones.

Vast numbers of phone boxes, particularly in rural locations, have been deemed unprofitable by BT and are facing the axe. Many on the "hit list" are red phone boxes dating back to the 1930s.

Now councils are being offered the chance to adopt or sponsor a phone box for £1.

Three options are available to councils. They include adopting a box for £1 and having the phone and all mechanisms removed leaving the council responsible for its upkeep; paying BT an annual fee of £500 - about half the annual cost to BT - to keep the phone inside the box; or doing nothing which will see the phone box removed.

There are 82 red phone boxes across the county and BT has said it will not remove any until October 1, the deadline for local authorities to submit an application to adopt or sponsor a kiosk.

At a meeting of Church Stretton Town Council on Tuesday, councillors discussed BT's proposals but discounted paying towards the running costs as they felt no-one used it.

The council will now to speak to the All Stretton Village Society. If the villagers want the box for heritage purposes, the council will pay the £1, but will ask the society to be responsible for its upkeep. The council would retain ownership.

Ruth Grafton, chairman of the All Stretton Village Society, said that they hoped the box would be used as a tourist information point.

"We have a history group in the village who are keen to keep this box as a feature."

By Catherine Roche