British Banks as censors

Readers of this magazine would be well aware of the latest disturbing phenomenon of banks and financial institutions stepping outside of their core business of managing money and waging war on ‘wrongthink’. While the most high-profile casualty seems to be Nigel Farage, the UK Free Speech Union and the Tiggernometry Podcast have also been targeted by PayPal and Tide, respectively.

Even though a public outcry led to their accounts being reinstated, this has not stopped financial institutions acting as the self-appointed thought police in the same way that Big Tech has.

One of Britain’s leading women’s rights campaigners, Dr Lesley Sawers OBE, the Equalities and Human Rights Commissioner for Scotland, has had her bank account shut down by the Royal Bank of Scotland. Dr Sawers said that the bank ‘categorically refused to give us a reason why they are closing our account and when I spoke to someone in customer services I was told abruptly: “We don’t have to”.’

Registered charity Families Need Fathers claim that HSBC shut their account in April and they were forced to use credit cards to keep running. Colin Mair, once the Ukip group leader on Lincolnshire County Council, had his account shut down without explanation.

Under the UK Equality Act, it is against the law to discriminate against customers on the basis of their religious and philosophical beliefs.

But banks and other financial services seem to think that they can get away with closing people’s accounts for their views as long as they don’t say why.

A whistleblower who worked in a Santander branch helping with complaints, told the Daily Mail Online that the bank is on a ‘really toxic path’ and has been ‘policing the views of their customers’. He said LGBT groups in the bank had pressured bosses to axe one customer because she complained about Pride flags in branches and told them to stick to banking.

Now banks have taken their puritanical war on freedom of speech to a new, more sinister level, by adopting the Nero approach and specifically targeting Christian organisations.

Core Issues Trust, a non-profit Christian ministry that supports men and women who voluntarily seek change in sexual preference and expression, had its bank accounts closed following a campaign of harassment and intimidation.

The group has received abusive calls and messages, and been dropped by multiple service providers since being targeted through a social media campaign.

After Barclays Bank closed the ministry’s bank accounts, the Christian Legal Centre helped challenge the decision through the courts.

Eventually, Barclays agreed to pay over £20,000 in compensation to the group.

There is also the case of Anglican vicar, Reverend Richard Fothergill, cancelled by the Yorkshire Building Society (YBS). Last month Fothergill responded to a monthly email he gets from YBS asking for his feedback, after noticing that it was displaying support for Pride month on its website. He wrote out ‘a couple of paragraphs’ about how he did not agree with trans ideology – or the idea that you can have alternative genders – being pushed on children.

On 22 June he received a letter from YBS about his ‘views regarding LGBTQIA+’. It said the comments he made were ‘not tolerable’, that their ‘relationship had irrevocably broken down’ and the building society had a ‘zero tolerance approach to discrimination’.

Speaking to the Times, Fothergill said, ‘I wasn’t even aware that our relationship had a problem. They are a financial house – they are not there to do social engineering. I think they should concentrate their efforts on managing money, instead of promoting LGBT ideology.’

Now the matter of a Christian charity organisation working in Nigeria having its accounts closed in the UK has emerged.

While the world focusses on the war in Ukraine, the daily bloodshed in Nigeria is ignored. Violent attacks on Christians and their churches are commonplace, and in the country’s south-east, warlords have usurped local authority and nothing – including marriages and funerals – can be done without their approval. A spate of gruesome killings, kidnappings and extortion rackets has left residents there living in fear.

The unrest has forced people to flee villages where they led a peaceful life until just a few years ago. Where so many live in abject poverty and in fear of their lives, this organisation (which wishes to remain anonymous for fear of further reprisal) carries out its ministry, caring for hundreds of refugees from conflict, feeding children and providing schooling and health care among all the trauma and bloodshed.

It prioritises patients who would otherwise not be able to afford treatment, particularly young mothers and those suffering from HIV and chronic hepatitis B.

It also runs a displacement camp, not just for Christians, but for Muslims who have also been subjected to violence, thus promoting peace and reconciliation.

Even though clearly carrying out the Gospel messages of the Good Samaritan, loving thy neighbour and thy enemy, caring for the most vulnerable in our world, the charity is considered ‘intolerant’ and their bank accounts in the UK are also being shut down, without reasons being given.

In all these instances, the banks seem to be using EU laws incorporated into the UK to close the accounts of ‘politically exposed persons’ (PEPs), in the same way Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau froze the bank accounts of the Canadian truckers and their supporters who were protesting his government’s vaccine mandate.

Ostensibly, PEP laws were designed to ensure politicians can’t take bribes or launder money. However, following the revelation that UK Chancellor Jeremy Hunt was denied a bank account because he was a PEP, UK banks are facing a Treasury investigation into claims they are using these laws to close customers’ accounts because they do not like their views on politics, Brexit, gender and sexuality. Indeed, the UK government is now moving to scrap the EU PEP laws altogether. Nevertheless, there is clearly a trend here.

Behave yourself and you can live a measure of a normal life; challenge the approved ideology and you will be punished, including ‘switching off’ access to your money, and the Marxist commissars who enforce this new cultural revolution dare to call themselves ‘progressive’ and ‘tolerant’.

https://www.spectator.com.au/2023/07/banks-do-a-nero/?

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My other blogs. Main ones below:

http://edwatch.blogspot.com (EDUCATION WATCH)

http://antigreen.blogspot.com (GREENIE WATCH)

http://pcwatch.blogspot.com (POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH)

http://australian-politics.blogspot.com/ (AUSTRALIAN POLITICS)

http://dissectleft.blogspot.com (DISSECTING LEFTISM)

https://immigwatch.blogspot.com/ (IMMIGRATION WATCH)

https://awesternheart.blogspot.com/ (THE PSYCHOLOGIST)

http://jonjayray.com/blogall.html More blogs

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