South Shropshire's MP is "devastated" after being told that the region will not have a banking hub while bank branches still serve the area.
Speaking in Parliament on Wednesday (June 25), Mr Anderson said he does not "want to wait for every bank to close" before South Shropshire has a banking hub set up.
00:00I also want to thank my friend for calling the debate, the Honourable Member from South West Hertfordshire.
00:07Banking hubs are really important in his constituency, but I think rural constituencies across the country, like South Shropshire, this is very important.
00:16So I have a 700 square mile constituency of the most beautiful towns and villages that are a delight.
00:25But with this beauty and tranquillity comes remoteness and lack of connectivity for many people who can feel isolated.
00:34So we've seen the decline of the High Street Bank over years.
00:38And some of these services that we would have taken for granted are no longer available.
00:42But I still believe that they're of huge importance to the local communities.
00:47So we've recently lost Lloyds Bank in both Bridge North and Ludlow.
00:51And this is seen as a major loss to both towns.
00:55I was quick to launch my survey on the closure of these to find out what residents thought.
01:00And overwhelmingly, they were really upset about this.
01:03And they still require face-to-face services and access to cash.
01:08So we were very fortunate to have Dudley Building Society to come to Bridge North recently, open it just opposite my office.
01:17But they don't offer the full services traditional banks do.
01:20And setting up banking hubs, it's not that viable for them at the moment.
01:24So that's quite hard to do.
01:26So I wrote to many different organisations to see what support we could get on our High Street.
01:32And Link come back to me and they have conducted assessment, as many members have pointed out here today.
01:37But they didn't recommend any additional services in any of my rural towns.
01:44And they've looked at this because they believe that there is adequate access for local residents in all of these areas to access to cash and banking services, which I disagree with.
01:56So Bridge North is served by Nationwide and HSBC, while Ludlow has NatWest and Nationwide.
02:04If you're not with those banks, you're stuck.
02:07And you might have been with Lloyd's for years.
02:09And then you find that you've got to travel to either Wolverhampton or, if you're in Ludlow, you've got to go to Hereford, which is probably 40 minutes.
02:15It's not suitable for everyone.
02:17So I believe this approach is a reactive approach that watches the decline of our High Street.
02:25And we should have a change in the process where we can be proactive and the regulation can change to allow Link to be able to put these services into the High Street.
02:36And I don't want to see or wait for every bank to close before we can get a banking hub.
