Stone secures meeting with Lloyds over banking hubs

North MP Jamie Stone is making progress in his bid to persuade banks to pool resources and open "banking hubs" in the Highlands following a series of branch closures.

Philip Grant, chairman of Scottish executive committee for Lloyds Banking Group, which includes the Bank of Scotland, has agreed to Mr Stone’s request to meet and discuss opening shared facilities.

Mr Stone has also written to the Royal Bank of Scotland, TSB and Clydesdale Bank but has yet to receive replies.

“I am pleased that Lloyds accepts we need to change how banking operates in the far north," said Mr Stone, the Liberal Democrat MP for Caithness, Sutherland and Easter Ross.

“My constituents shouldn’t have to travel over a hundred miles just to access banking services and it’s high time that banks responded to the banking crisis we are facing in the far north and other rural areas of the UK.

I am pleased that Lloyds accepts we need to change how banking operates in the far north.

“If banks were to work together they could provide a joint branch in every community over a certain size, giving customers face-to-face advice and the ability to accept cash and cheques, regardless of which bank you are actually with. And that is what I will be speaking to Lloyds about.”

It was announced last that the Clydesdale branch in Brora will be shutting later in the year. That will leave just one bank branch remaining in Sutherland – the Bank of Scotland in Golspie.

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