Greenpeace activists use superglue to shut the doors of bank

Branch in Hinckley was one of a number targeted by activists

CLIMATE change activists forced the closure of the Barclays bank branch in the town centre after they superglued the doors shut.

Customers had to be turned away, with signs spray painted on the floor and left on the doors, in a day of national action on March 2.

A sign on the floor outside the entrance read: “Barclays: Stop funding the climate emergency. Greenpeace.”

Stanley Rooney posted about the sudden closure on Facebook after his wife went to the branch to cash some cheques for Hinckley Music Club.

He said: “Barclays Bank closed this morning due to Greenpeace idiots. What gives these people the right to close down a national business/disrupt their customers due to some inane notion.

“High time we got a grip on the

Thunberg faction, disrupting children’s education and now me. To absolutely no purpose.

“This is anti social behaviour, the police need to take action.”

The Hinckley branch has since reopened.

Greenpeace advocates also targeted branches in Loughborough and Leicester, as well as in Birmingham, Coventry and Nuneaton in the early hours of Monday March 2.

The activists are demanding that Barclays, as the biggest funder of fossil fuels among European banks, stop propping up oil, gas and coal companies and channel funding into renewable energy.

A spokesperson for Barclays said: “Our priority is to ensure the health and safety of our colleagues and customers and we are working hard to get the branches open as soon as we possibly can although we are not able to give an exact timescale.

“We recognise that climate change is one of the greatest challenges facing the world today, and are determined to do all we can to support the transition to a low carbon economy, while also ensuring that global energy needs continue to be met.

“Greenpeace has a view on these issues to which they are completely entitled, but we would ask that – in expressing that view – they stop short of behaviour which targets our customers, and our colleagues, going about their lives in communities around the country.”

Some 100 branches up and down the country were targeted by the campaigners, with pop-up exhibitions set up and staffed by activists to block access to major branches.

Morten Thaysen, climate finance campaigner at Greenpeace UK, said: “Barclays must stop funding the climate emergency, that’s why we’ve taken action today.

“From floods to bushfires and record heat in Antarctica, the impacts of this crisis are staring us in the face.

“Yet Barclays keeps pumping billions into fossil fuel companies at exactly the time we need to stop backing these polluting businesses.

“Banks are just as responsible for the climate emergency as the fossil fuel companies they fund, yet they’ve escaped scrutiny for years.

“We’ve shut down branches across the country to shine a spotlight on Barclays’ role in bankrolling this emergency.

“It’s time Barclays pulled the plug and backed away from funding fossil fuels for good.”