SHADOW home secretary Chris Grayling will visit Hanley Swan Post Office on Friday (May 22) to meet the postmaster who was badly injured in a burglary.

Alan Davies suffered a fractured skull after being hit on the head with a crowbar by the two teenagers who raided the post office in August 2005. Although the two were sentenced in October 2006 to 12 years jail, the sentence was cut on appeal, which prompted more than 4,500 people to sign a protest petition.

Tory parliametary candidate Harriett Baldwin said: “Mercifully, violent crime is extremely unusual in West Worcestershire. However, Mr Davies’s terrible experience highlights some of the problems in our criminal justice system today. We need to end the current government’s disastrous policy of early release and we need to introduce honesty in sentencing.”