Market Rasen Town Council office to remain open

The office has a glass screen between the office staff and members of the public, so direct contact will not be made.

The Tuesday West Lindsey Surgery is now closed until further notice.

Coun Steve Bunney who chairs the finance and facilities committee, and also serves as a West Lindsey District Councillor, said: “I think it is important, where possible, we have a presence of councillors on a rota on the days we are open, so if anyone comes in they have that opportunity.

“I am happy to do quite a bit of that, as a district councillor.

“My reason for doing that, not that I want to put anyone in danger, but if anyone needs to consult West Lindsey over things, they are not going to have the office here and they can’t get there (West Lindsey’s Gainsborough office).

“They might have housing issues; benefits are also dealt with and all that sort of thing.

“We need to make sure people have a number to phone and they can pop in if they wish to do that.

“However, bear in mind we will no doubt have to have limited opening as time goes on.

“Presumably, people won’t be going out, but we just don’t know what social issues people are going to have and they are going to need some ways of communication.

“However, what we don’t want is people coming down and getting cross at West Lindsey and taking it out on our people.”

The council will continue to monitor the situation as new government guidance is given.

Coun Bunney continued: “In all reality, although we don’t know when, it looks like we are going to be taking things into the summer and September before things start kicking back in - even longer than that.

“We will have to revisit decisions.”

Council members will look at the position for the April council meeting and beyond, with a decision being made by March 30.

However, they say there is a strong likelihood the April meetings will be cancelled and , what ever happens, the Annual Town Meeting will be cancelled.

The council is also looking into ways of continuing to run council business, including video conferencing and telephone conferencing.