Greenwich’s Labour and Conservative councillors have united to call for a banking hub to open in Eltham High Street.
Santander closed last month and Halifax will shut in October, leaving Nationwide Building Society as the last financial institution with a presence in the area.
Most banks across the borough of Greenwich have closed in recent years, although NatWest, Santander, Lloyds, HSBC and Barclays are still represented in Woolwich, where Halifax is also closing a branch.
Otherwise residents who need to do their banking in person have to use branches in Lewisham, Bexleyheath or further afield.
But there is an alternative in Welling, where a Banking Hub opened nearly two years ago. Representatives of the big banks take it in turns to staff the hub each day, while the Post Office provides a counter for day-to-day transactions.
Eltham Town Labour councillor Lauren Dingsdale proposed the motion at last week’s council meeting. She told councillors: “When I popped into the Santander branch recently, it was busy.
“The banks aren’t closing because nobody needs them – they’re closing because their balance sheets come before our communities. Banks are still making record profits. They can afford to meet their social responsibilities and they should do so.
“Banking hubs are already helping communities across the country, including in our neighboring boroughs. They provide shared physical services, a rotating community banker, and essential access to cash. Eltham deserves better and our residents should not be left behind.”
Charlie Davis, an Eltham Town Conservative councillor who has previously campaigned on the issue, said that opening banking hubs had increased footfall in other towns. “Customers using hubs spent 71 per cent more in surrounding shops,” he said. “A recent study by London Economics confirmed that banking hubs deliver real economic value to town centres.”
Councillors lined up to support the motion. Conservative Eltham Town councillor Pat Greenwell said she knew of a church seniors group that was sent into a “total panic” by the closure of Barclays, council leader Anthony Okereke said he had to travel to Lewisham to visit the Co-operative Bank, while Labour’s Pat Slattery recalled her father, who had dementia, going into NatWest in Greenwich every day “to check his millions. Happily, in a way, he died before they closed because he would’ve been extremely distraught. But they have closed and so has the one in Blackheath Village.”
Labour’s Olu Babatola, representing Thamesmead West, said: “I just want this council to remember Thamesmead. It hasn’t got a single bank, so please, going forward, whatever is good for Eltham is good for Thamesmead and the rest of the borough.”
Raja Zeeshan, the remaining Shooters Hill Labour councillor after last month’s by-election, followed up with: “Cllr Babatola rightly said that after Eltham, it is essential for Thamesmead. But what about Shooters Hill?”
The motion called on Jackie Smith, the cabinet member for inclusive economy, business and skills, to meet Link, the cash machine group that controls banking hubs, to discuss opening one in Eltham.
But she warned that banking hubs were “clearly for major town centres, and the strict criteria is that there must be no bank. Eltham will still have nationwide and thankfully Nationwide have promised that they will not shut any branches in the country until at least 2028.
“I will fight my best for it, but I’m not saying I’m not optimistic because I think people know that when I say I’m going to fight, I’ll fight. But we’ve had a Post Office closure in Woolwich and they’ve been very difficult on finding a replacement. I’m told we’re having one, they won’t tell us where, they won’t tell us when.”
All Labour, Conservative, Green and independent councillors backed the motion.
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