Post Office managers yesterday admitted four more branches faced the axe as it confirmed a leaked list of 22 closures across the county.

A string of post office closures was revealed in Saturday's Oxford Mail amid uproar from customers and post masters and mistresses.

But the company also admitted it planned to include an additional five branches in West Oxfordshire. Outlets at Great Tew, Enstone, Chadlington, Tackley and Great Rollright would be replaced by so-called "outreach services" - such as mobile post offices.

Chadlington's sub postmaster Martin Chapman said: "We are going to fight it vigorously. We do not think it is logical or makes any sense on any level. And of course it puts our shop under threat."

At Chadlington, the Post Office wants to set up a service which could be based in a shop or community centre, for just nine hours a week, or a mobile van for the same period.

However, local people are used to seeing their post office open six days a week - a total of 41 hours.

Manager Tracy Waldron said several hundred people had signed a protest petition already. She added: "The proposed alternatives are not suit- able."

A public meeting has been called in Tackley Village Hall on Friday, February 15, at 6pm to protest against plans to replace the post office with a "partner service" - such as one of the village pub's running a part-time post office.

An alternative could be three weekly visits by a van, amounting to a total of seven hours, compared to the existing six-day, 36-hours a week opening.

Sub postmistress Barbara Vaughan said: "If we look at the range of services that are available through an outreach partnership, they are seriously restrictive and it means our population would lose access to nearly half the activity that we can do at the moment."

At Great Tew, it is only planned to offer two hours a week, compared with 20 hours, while Great Rollright would get seven hours a week, compared to 44 and a half hours.

But Enstone would be open longer, from 49 hours to 72 hours, as the post office counter would be in a shop.

Meanwhile, a source told the Oxford Mail some postmasters were afraid to talk to the press. Postmasters had signed a confidentiality agreement with the Post Office and believed they would lose their compensation if they spoke out.

A Post Office spokesman dismissed the suggestion, saying: "Some information that is discussed with sub postmasters is in commercial confidence and so it is in their own interest as well as ours to sign a confidentiality agreement.

"This definitely does not constitute a gagging order and it is up to individual sub postmasters to decide if they want to speak to the media."