Julian meets with Minister to protect access to cash
July 27, 2023
Last week, Julian met Andrew Griffith MP, the Economic Secretary to the Treasury to discuss his Access to Cash campaign.
In recent months and years, Julian has become increasingly concerned by diminishing cash points around York and Britain more generally. This direction of travel leaves several groups behind with few options. Accessing cash is paramount for elderly, disabled and vulnerable people as they are less likely to be comfortable or able to manage with cashless payments such as card, contactless or Apple Pay methods, this has left lots of people unhappy and Julian has received plenty of letters of concern from constituents.
While most people benefit from the speed, ease and convenience that digital payments provide, cash remains an important payment method for millions of consumers and businesses. With rising living costs placing additional pressure on people’s personal finances, the consequences of being unable to withdraw cash for those consumers who already rely on it could be significant.
Despite this, the cash network has been cut considerably in recent years, with the pandemic putting additional pressure on an already fragile infrastructure. As of 2022, there are 12,178 fewer free-to-use ATMs in operation compared with August 2018, with the York Outer constituency being no exception, with one in four local cash machines being lost during this period. At the same time, we have seen a stark uptick in the rate of bank branch closures, with an average of 99 closures taking place per month in 2021 compared to an average of 52 per month since 2015.
The purpose on Julian’s meeting with Mr Griffith was to raise these concerns officially and see what the Minister is doing to ensure people are not left in the lurch as the inevitable transition to a cashless society gathers pace.
The Minister assured Julian that in any future Financial Bills, more will be done to ensure the aforementioned groups are not disregarded.
