It would be a pleasant surprise if the Financial Conduct Authority, the financial ombudsman, the chancellor or the prime minister could “work up an indignant head of steam” (Don’t be fooled: this row is about more than Nigel Farage and Coutts – what lies beneath is Brexit, 27 July) about the number of ex-offenders who are either refused bank accounts or have financial services withdrawn. I was one of many former prisoners who had banking facilities suddenly withdrawn by my bank without warning or explanation. As far as the ombudsman was concerned, it was a business decision for the bank and therefore not open to challenge.
I also don’t recall the wave of closures of high street bank branches – which affected millions who can’t bank online – troubling the movers and shakers who rushed to support Nigel Farage. According to the ombudsman, “businesses that provide bank accounts are generally entitled to close them – just as their customers are”. As the French writer Anatole France put it: “The law, in its majestic equality, forbids the rich as well as the poor to sleep under bridges...”
Nick Moss
London
• I trained as a nurse at Middlesex hospital in London in 1966. There was a branch of Coutts in the hospital, and the bank clerks wore tails. I and most of my friends banked with it for convenience, but also because its cheques were beautiful, almost works of art. My salary was around £800 a year, and every month I was overdrawn by £5 or £6. In my second year, I received a beautifully crafted letter on thick embossed paper from Coutts, telling me to take my account elsewhere, with no explanation. The letter ended: “We remain, madam, your most obedient servant.”
I was not, and am still not, xenophobic, chauvinistic or racist, and my salary was definitely below commercial criteria. Unlike Nigel Farage, I made no fuss.
Alison Crowther
Oxford
• Coutts closes Nigel Farage’s account and the government goes into overdrive. We can only hope and pray that he will find both his local NatWest branch and railway ticket office have been closed, then perhaps something will be done about this blow to so many people.
David Simpson
Datchet, Berkshire
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