Council urged to cut links with RBS
Pressure is mounting on Stirling Council to rethink its links to the Royal Bank of Scotland amid the controversial closure of many of its branches.
RBS is the council’s current banking services provider, the current contract for which is due to expire on May 31 this year.
Council officers are currently conducting a procurement process to ensure a new banking contract is in place from June.
However, councillors and politicians outwith the local authority are asking whether RBS should still be in the running.
At a full Stirling Council meeting last Thursday, SNP councillor Graham Houston asked:“What discretion do we have in terms of where we are banking because I think it’s quite unconscionable that we as a council continue our relationship with RBS given they have treated people with absolute disdain?”
The council’s chief governance officer Iain Strachan, however, stepped in to warn councillors they could leave the council open to legal challenge if the discussion continued.
He added:“We need to be mindful of our obligations in that it is a regulated process so I wouldn’t want anyone to say anything that might be misperceived.”
Chief finance officer Jim Boyle told members that the process was conducted by officers under delegated powers, adding:“We have to be careful about changing the rules of procurement midprocess because we will have a different set of criteria. If we were to introduce something now we would leave the council potentially open to legal challenge.”
Mr Boyle had earlier said that in terms of the council’s own retail banking contracts it didn’t make“any great use of branches”, therefore there was a different impact.
He added:“While no one would want to downplay the impact on communities we do get a good service from RBS.”
SNP councillor for Bannockburn ward Alasdair Macpherson said later:“Given the decision to close the Bannockburn branch, I am confident my constituents, who have been disgracefully betrayed by RBS, would want the council to shift their banking facilities elsewhere.”
Tory regional MSPs Alexander Stewart and Dean Lockhart later expressed their “acute disappointment”at RBS’s inclusion in the council procurement process.
Mr Stewart, Scottish Conservative Shadow Minister for Local Government, said: “The bank has literally turned its back and shows its utter contempt for local communities with their forthcoming closures of Bannockburn, Bridge of Allan and Dunblane High Street branches. They are paying lip service to the people who need them the most and are clearly not interested in the needs of rural customers in Scotland, especially in towns with a high proportion of the retired and elderly, many of whom are often unable, or indeed choose not to bank online.
“RBS has also abandoned local businesses who rely on them of all kinds of services,
“For Stirling Council even to consider the bank in its procurement process is an absolute joke.”
Shadow Cabinet Secretary for Economy, Jobs and Fair Work, Mr Lockhart said the inclusion was“shortsighted in the extreme”and would concern communities across Stirling.
“Stirling Council have serious questions to answer about the process going forward and along with colleagues I will be pressing officials to explain exactly when this procurement process was initiated.”