DAVID Laws MP has blasted the “entirely unsatisfactory” consultation process carried out by RBS in relation to the closure of the Natwest Bank in South Petherton.

The MP for the Yeovil constituency has responded to a letter he received from Ross McEwan, Chief Executive of RBS, claiming that the bank has a “clear determination” to ignore “very strong public resistance” to the closure.

The News reported last month that a petition against the proposal for closure attracted more than 900 signatures.

Mr Laws: “From the very start of this process, when RBS announced plans to close the NatWest branch in South Petherton, the bank has shown a real determination to ignore local residents’ views about these proposals.

“RBS has also chosen to ignore the facts they were presented with in writing and at the public meeting we held in South Petherton at the end of last year.

“Despite telling local residents when they closed the branch in Martock a few months previously, that they would be able to use the branch in South Petherton, RBS has pressed ahead with this closure in what is considered to be bad faith.

“The bank has also failed to give us timely, accurate branch transaction figures which they have used to explain and justify this decision. We have been given three different explanations of transaction data, and we are still not in a position to make an appropriate judgement on what this tells us.

“First we were told transactions at the branch were falling, then that they were rising, and now that they are flat. This is hopeless in terms of making evidence-based decisions.

“What there was by way of a consultation process has been incredibly u unsatisfactory, and has only served to highlight the bank’s obvious desire to press ahead with this closure at all costs, ignoring local residents’ opinions and fears.

“I have written to the bank again to make my views on this clear and to challenge the way this is being dealt with by the bank.”