On Monday morning, I was driving through Cheddar shortly after 9am and the queue at Lloyds Bank extended out of the door and on to the pavement outside. I couldn't help laugh because last week, Professor Russel Griggs was holding meetings at a hotel in Street to discuss our experiences of bank closures before he presents his review of the Access to Banking Protocols to Government.
Professor Griggs has spent quite a few months travelling across the UK speaking to the banks, the communities that have lost them and looking at the evidence of the way we now seek to do our banking. He is something of an expert but it was, nonetheless, very welcome that he should come and meet with me along with local businesses and representatives of the Glastonbury community.
He presents his report next week but the sad reality is that all the evidence suggests that we do not choose our banks based on their branch lay down and we do not punish them by taking away our business when a local branch is closed. Regardless of what I saw in Cheddar this week, usage of branches is falling away very rapidly indeed.
Professor Griggs will have to acknowledge that in his report but so too will he need to make a recommendation on how we make sure that the most vulnerable are not left behind. 99% of us may be willing to bank on our smart phones but that doesn't mean we needn't worry about those who can't. We must balance the banks' right to pursue a profit with the absolute necessity of ensuring access to banking for all.