Banks: Closures and Shared Banking Hubs

Lord Blunkett Excerpts

Thursday 27th April 2023 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Penn (Con)]

I absolutely commend building societies and all businesses that have a commitment to local communities and are thinking about how they can make their services as accessible as possible. There are many different routes to ensuring accessibility. We should focus on the outcome for the customer and embrace the different routes that this can be delivered by.

[Lord Blunkett (Lab)]

My Lords, the bigger the profit, the less customer service there is. This has happened over the last decade. There are still some banks pretending that they are disabled by Covid and that is why you cannot get through on the phone, and the local branch is closed so you cannot actually talk to anyone. Will the Minister ask the banks to start putting the customer first and ensure that there are facilities available, not just at the odd hub but in local communities, which, in the past, could rely on serious, person-to-person customer service?

[Baroness Penn (Con)]

My Lords, a process has been put in place to allow communities to make the case through LINK for where they need access to further services, and there is a commitment that if something is deemed necessary, it will be implemented. The noble Lord is right that it is essential that the interests of consumers are properly considered in all areas of financial services. There is the new consumer duty, which is due to be implemented later this year and will take forward some of his suggestions.