Peter Williams: Faraged

How the Royal Family's bank shut down the Brexiteer

The banking woes of Nigel Farage are confirmed.

The Brexit movement leader and broadcaster had his account at the prestigious Coutts Bank closed because the bank didn’t like his political views.

Farage even obtained the dossier which Coutts, where the Royals bank, wrote about him.

In the rather pompous world of British banking, the publication is the minutes of Coutts “Wealth Reputational Risk Committee.” It says Farage’s “publicly stated views were at odds with our position as an inclusive organisation.”

Which is about as un-inclusive as you can get.

These “views” include Farage’s stance on Brexit, his friendship with Donald Trump and his support of Novak Djokovic. The bank described Farage as a “disingenuous grifter with xenophobic, chauvinistic and racist views.”

Once he’d paid off a mortgage, they closed his account.

But Farage has found some friends in high places.

The British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak has said that shutting someone’s bank account because of their political views was wrong and that free speech is the cornerstone of a democracy.

The British government is now looking at putting extra conditions on banking licenses, and a license could be stripped if a customer’s right to free speech is compromised.

The Treasury is also likely to put in place a rule that banks must give customers three months notice before closing an account instead of one, and must give an “explicit” explanation of why the account was being closed, and customers would retain their right of appeal.

Farage, who doesn’t have too many friends in the Tory government, has praised the swift intervention because as he says, the politicians could see the bankers coming for them too at some stage in future.

The boss of Natwest, which owns Coutts, has apologised to Farage. Dame Alison Rose says the comments about him were “deeply inappropriate” and “do not reflect the view of the bank.”

Which is patent nonsense, because the comments were written in a bank document by a bank committee.

The Natwest also seems to forget it is still 38 percent owned by the British taxpayer after it was bailed out in the GFC all those years ago.

Nigel Farage has made a very important stand. Everybody needs a bank account. Even for man who could be kindly described as a “polarising” figure, he has gained considerable public, political and media support for his predicament.

For a bank to close an account based on a customer’s political views is very, very dangerous.

I’d like to think this sort of thing doesn’t happen here.

But as our corporates, including financial institutions, become more and more influenced by matters other than returns to shareholders, don’t be surprised if a similar scenario emerges in this country.

Peter Williams was a writer and broadcaster for half a century. Now watching from the sidelines. Peter blogs regularly on Peter’s Substack where this article was sourced.