Shocked at

MP Gray urges a meeting with bank bosses

Airdrie’s branch of the Royal Bank of Scotland is to close in May, following the bank’s announcement of plans to close 62 of its offices across the country.

RBS officials say transactions at the Graham Street branch have reduced by a third in the past five years, as part of a “dramatic” change in customers’ banking habits – and say that “with only 129 customers now visit the branch on a weekly basis”.

Airdrie MP Neil Gray says the decision is “shocking” and has written to RBS chief executive Ross McEwan to request a meeting “to see if there is some way that this closure can be stopped”.

Trade union Unite called the move “a massive blow” and said of the UK- wide closure programme – affecting 259 RBS and NatWest branches across the country, with 680 redundancies expected: “The sheer scale of this latest round of branch closures is savage.”

Union officials added: “Proposals to close one in three branches are ‘morally bankrupt.”

An RBS spokesperson told the Advertiser that the “difficult decision” to close down the Airdrie branch on May 24 next year had been made “after careful consideration of factors including changes in customer usage of the branch over a long period; how often customers use the branch and the transactions they undertake; the number of customers who only bank via the branch; and other ways our customers can bank locally.”

The bank has not confirmed how many staff will be affected by the closure of the Airdrie branch.

RBS said: “Ninety per cent of [Airdrie branch] customers already bank in other ways locally; and 55 per cent of customers are now choosing to bank digitally with us on a regular basis instead.

“We are communicating with our customers affected by the closure and proactively contacting vulnerable customers and regular branch users.

“We have extended the time between announcing our decision and the branch closure to six months so we can ensure our customers have enough time to consider the right banking options for them, and to support them one-to-one during the transition.”

The bank added of the impact of the hundreds of closures across the country: “We expect these to result in around 680 redundancies.

“We realise this is difficult news for our colleagues and we are doing everything we can to support those affected, and will ensure compulsory redundancies are kept to an absolute minimum.”

Mr Gray told the Advertiser: “It’s devastating for Airdrie town centre to lose an iconic business in an iconic property on its high street.

“I’m very sad for staff who may now be at risk of losing their jobs; and to say I’m disappointed at this decision from RBS to close the Airdrie branch would be a gross understatement.

“Alex Neil MSP and I have requested an urgent meeting with RBS management to ask them to reconsider and ensure that the concerns of our constituents are heard.

“Like so many others, I have to question the footfall figures from RBS – because whenever I have been going past the Airdrie branch, it has been busy.

“We know from experience in Shotts [where RBS closed its branch in August 2016] the problems from the bank going out of town – that’s also a prominent building which has lain empty ever since and we can’t have history repeating itself in Airdrie.”

Mr Gray added: “I understand high street banking is changing, but for a state-owned bank to cut its branch network so brutally is particularly disappointing.