A village protest against the bank closure is being planned for next Wednesday on & near the village green. The time is yet to be decided, but if you would like to get involved please pop into the Village Charity Shop and Judit will be happy to give you the details.
Protest updated: We hear, Radio Solent will outside the bank at around 7.10am tomorrow (Weds) and then South Today will be interviewing Hugh Whitlock at 10am. If you can be around that would be great.
ReplyDeleteOPEN LETTER - Part One
ReplyDeleteDear Mr Tamplin
The members of the village action group against the planned closure of the village bank are sad that you have not replied to the invitation to join them for lunch when you visit your sub branch today. They had wished to discuss this proposed closure with you in the hope that you may, in fact, sympathise with the distress expressed by the village community when it learned of this decision and may, even at this eleventh hour, be able to put some pressure to bear on your superiors to reconsider their decision and, by so doing, elevate your customers’ perception of HSBC’s helpful image and dispel the perceived patronising, weak and spurious arguments that the Bank has put forward as reasons for this proposed closure.
The reasons that HSBC is wrong to take away this vital asset to the village are summarised:
1. Milford on Sea is NOT a small community: there are 5,000 residents. It is a busy microcosm of life.
2. Milford on Sea provides:
(a) shops which cater for everyone’s everyday needs – newsagents, butchers, geengrocers, delicatessens, pubs, hairdressers, fishmongers, books, wool, fabric, post office, beautician, vet and a bank.
(b) shops which cater for residents, holidaymakers and tourists alike: gifts, crafts, specialities, collectors, antiques
(c) doctors, out patients’ clinics, chemists
(d) leisure activities – sailing, swimming, fishing, beach, restaurants, pubs
(e) a Community Centre providing every sort of class imaginable, many arts based concerts, jazz and folk clubs, comedy club, ballroom and other dances.
Also at the Community Centre are meetings for elderly people - a Sunday Lunch Club, a Friendship Club, Alzheimer’s Society art and music classes, classes for people with learning disabilities, a youth club, youth band nights and much more
(f) special village activities which attract a huge number of visitors and residents alike: May Fair, the four day annual Arts and Music Festival, the carnival, the traders’ Christmas fair with carol singing on the Green, Duck races and, again, much more.
(g) a range of small businesses which fuel Milford’s economy: a Solicitor, estate agents, nursing homes, sheltered housing, local tradesmen who rely on clients who will always prefer local tradesmen - painters, decorators, gardeners, carers. And, supporting all these important businesses, charities and trades, - the LOCAL bank.
3. Milford on Sea is a real community - the sort the current coalition government would
hail as its ideal. People care about each other here. The spirit of the village means that everyone says hello. There are village characters. The whole village shares its joys and its tragedies. Even though it is a large village its residents care about individuals: the untimely death of one young man affected the whole village in some way. People will say what a wonderful place Milford is. As of course it is: Milford is privileged. It has the sea, a beach, wonderful walks, a village Green, a pond. It also has its underprivileged: its young families who can’t afford to buy a property here, its few young people for whom there is little to do but be a nuisance. But, Milford cares. It is striving to build affordable housing for its local people. It is striving to provide youth facilities. It is striving to make Milford a good place for visitors who will boost the economy for its local businesses during the good months to sustain them during the poorer months.
OPEN LETTER - Part Two
ReplyDeleteIt is, simply, the special quality of Milford on Sea’s community which enabled the village to win a lottery grant of half a million pounds which, together with another £500,000 built the new Community Centre in the village.
The Big Lottery had so much faith in Milford’s special community that it invested in this village.
The decision to close Milford’s bank is an insult to the faith that institutions grander than HSBC have shown in this village.
Shame on HSBC for failing to support this community in its efforts to provide a good life for ALL its residents.
4. Traders, shopkeepers, the tourism group, the Community Centre, the Parish Council all strive to make the good of the community their absolute priority. HSBC has sacrificed its resolution to be a ‘local’ bank with the good of the community at its heart, on the altar of profit.
But - what negative contribution to HSBC’s profit did Milford on Sea make? HSBC
apparently made a profit of £7m last year. Why then does a local much valued bank which
is not actually losing money need to be exterminated?
Presumably, since HSBC’s profit is so great it can afford to leave its village property empty even though it has a commitment to pay rent on this potentially continuously empty property for the next 23 years?
5. Much has been expressed about the problems for Milford on Sea residents if the bank is closed: its elderly population, its young families, its businesses who pay in their cash every day; its disabled, unsighted and under privileged as well as its more affluent customers who all equally value the local facility. It is conceded that many of these groups will be able to access banking elsewhere – but not without difficulty.
Milford on Sea’s sub branch is always busy. It is not accepted that it is underused. Why is it that one can go into the bank at any time and never find it empty and more likely to have to queue? Local people really do know that this is true. Do the decision makers really appreciate the position here on the ground?
6. Some 9 years ago HSBC’s competitor in this village, Lloyds Bank, closed its doors amid some anxiety. That anxiety was alleviated because the local village HSBC assured Lloyds’ customers that if they walked across the Village Green to the doors of HSBC they would be assured of a permanent welcome. HSBC profited from the closure of Lloyds in this village. The village was assured of a permanent HSBC presence here. Oh, that the village had this in writing! But there are of course many customers who remember that pledge and who are so angry that 9 years on they are to be deprived of their local facility. Perhaps they will go back to Lloyds - or anywhere but HSBC - what does it matter? - any bank will now be a carbon footprint away, a bus ride away, a taxi ride away, a close-the-shop-for-an-hour away, a parking ticket away, a can’t-find-a-parking-space away, a haven’t-got-time-before-picking-up-the-children away, a-can’t-be-bothered away, a-damned- nuisance away, a time out of this village away.
And, of course, while they are away banking perhaps they’ll buy their vegetables in the
supermarket, perhaps they’ll take their dry cleaning to the chain store, perhaps they’ll get
their prescriptions made up, perhaps they’ll buy their magazines, perhaps they’ll go to the
library, perhaps they’ll have lunch, perhaps they might as well do a supermarket shop and
perhaps they will also abandon this wonderful village following the lead of their highly
valued HSBC bank.
Please, HSBC, do the big thing. Rethink.
Yours sincerely
Susan Whitlock