“You can get a Subject Access Request, like Farage did.”

As I suspect a lot of people are doing right now…

Trying to keep it short and sweet morecash so apologies for the ‘do your own research’ line that I admit I’m taking. I’m not trying to win an argument with anyone, I know when I’m outnumbered so I’m just leaving a marker saying I think this situation is way bigger than one individual and will probably extend beyond the banks to include other institutions.

My own point of reference is the Arts Council, who have behaved in a similar fashion to Nat West and the like for a number of years and are now finding themselves in court. Too many people in positions of influence within institutions have been making decisions in an executive fashion based on their personal morality and ideas of good and bad, when in fact they don’t have the executive or legal authority to do so.

“What does ‘appear to you’ mean?”

Appears to me as it does to those who have had their accounts closed, in that the reasons that the accounts were closed were not divulged, so they (and I) can only suppose.

So yes, I am guessing that many people and organisations that have had their accounts closed have had them closed for political reasons.

Only time will tell wether my guess or your guess proves to be right.

I’m also guessing that many posting on here will have egg on their face in the near future when more information about this is forthcoming.

“let’s just circle around what we know.”

You’re circling around what you know, not what ‘we’ know,

I know of lots of accounts that have been closed for reasons that appear to me to be politically motivated. The information is out there if your search extends beyond the Guardian.

Farage was merely the zit that popped. He went public because of the political clout he has. He can exploit the situation to his advantage where others couldn’t.

Having your bank account closed without explanation (or justification) makes you look, and feel like a criminal, of you’re not a public figure like Farage then there is little to nothing you can do. It will effect your livlehood, your reputation, your bisiness (if you run one) and put a stain on your name when you seek another account or seek to take out a loan.

You will not be able to defend your reputation because the bank won’t tell you why they closed your account. There is no due process, that is why the government is getting involved.

But hey, Nigel Farage…

“What about”

Don’t you mean whataboutism?

“Have I missed something”

Yes.

Probably needs another thread called “denial of banking services to persons and organisations other than Nigel Farage.”

Agree 100% with chevy with regards the danger to democracy that this issue presents.

Nat West have behaved appallingly. HSBC will be the next bank with their heads on the chopping block, some of their actions have been even more aggregious.

Farage is only the beginning of this story.

“So who is denying the truth? With your quote from “some Greek philosopher” you seemed to suggest that the truth was being denied.”

Yes I did didn’t I….

You might find evidence for that over the last 7 pages of this thread.

It seems like some truths are now becoming apparent that had previously been occluded.

That truth was being occlused owing to a collective wallowing in schadenfreude, rather than a converstion about the ethical matter in question.

“I’d be fascinated to know, but the banks aren’t allowed to discuss it, so unless they make a fuss like Farage did, we are unlikely to find out.

Unless you have something to share?”

Did you catch Newsnight 5 minutes ago? Konstantin Kisin (comedian and podcaster) just came out and explained that the same thing has happened to him.

I wasn’t aware of this when I posted my comment 25 minutes ago, which either suggests that soon, others might start making a fuss or that I am in fact a pound shop Nostradamus.

“Looks like one or two on here were way off the mark.”

And continue to be so it seems…

As some Greek philosopher one said, – “Do you hate your enemies more than you love the truth?.”

Is no one curious as to what other persons and organisations have had their accounts closed recently?

Or is this just a p***ing competition to see which pound shop Frankie Boyle can come up with the most witty Nigel Farage insult?

Vinyl Exchange on Oldham Street n Manchester is the main regional trader, I’ve bouht and sold lots there over the years.

The way they value them (unlike a lot of other stores) is to jump on the computer and go straight to Discogs. They will then offer you 40% of what Discogs says. Although the staff have decades of specialist knowledge, they don’t need to use it to value a record these days, their decision to buy will be based on wether they have it in stock.

I’ll follow this thread with interest.  The Arts Council was taken to court last month by someone who was hounded out of their job after being subjected to a campaign of quite vicious harrasment after expressing support for the LGB Alliance.

She was a friend of mine when I was at Art college in the early 90’s.  She was the most socially conscious, feminist, Gay rights person that I knew back then (and still is).

She won her case for harassment.

I think you’ll find that bigotry is alive and well Cougar…

Discogs first, discogs second and then try discogs.

There’s always a serial number pressed into the vinyl where the needle runs off, type this number into discogs and it will tell you what version you have (original pressing etc). I’ll bet you that if you do that you’ll surprise yourself at how much some are worth.

Or encourage your son to hold on to them as they will definitely increase in value, probably doubling in value every 5 years or so. As someone above mentioned,  punk was a seminal cultural moment that history isn’t going to forget and those records will only be going up in value.

With all the talk of stickers and original artwork etc the likelihood is that there’s at least a few nuggets in there.

As above, not very good for a full load, can take ages and burns through a lot of electricity.

However, I’ve got one and I use it for drying socks and underwear, as they tend to take more than 24 hours to dry when hung up to air dry.

Sheets, shirts, trousers and sweatshirts etc tend to dry overnight so I don’t bother to tumble dry them, it would take ages and cost a lot to do so.

I’d advise getting a machine with slower dry cycles, as the ones with quicker cycles can get very hot and damage clothes with synthetic mixed fibres etc. I got a Hotpoint.

EDIT:

Sounds obvious but shirts, t-shirts and troisers dry a lot quicker if you put them on a hangar rather than a drying rack.

I read an article in the Economist that said UK productivity was the lowest of the G12, excluding Russia (though I read the article last year so things could have changed since then…)

They also mentioned that back in 2000’s it was second only to the USA. What’s changed in the interim I wonder?

Within 30 seconds of opening this thread a bumble bee buzzed in through the balcony door (city centre flat).

Bees seem to be doing really well over the last couple of years after what seemed like a decade or more of declining numbers. Good thing obvs.

“I suspect the Farage case and Yorkshire BS policy are not related.”  –

“No it’s just the Daily Telegraph that is trying to tie the two together.”

Not just the Telegraph ernie, you’ve done exactly the same by starting a thread titled “Building society closes accounts of ‘rude or discriminate’ customers” and then linking to a story not about rude or discriminate customers but about Farage’s financial probity.

“Conservatives are always going on about a business’ right to not provide service to a customer if they wish (ie gay wedding cakes).”

And now we’re on about banks rights not to provide a service to a customer based on subjective (and perhaps political) grounds?

An eye for an eye and all that…

Sorry for replying to the actual thread title.

If a bank or building society doesn’t want to do business with someone because of their dodgy financial dealings then that’s one thing.

However, to the threads title, rude and discriminatory are subjective qualities and depend entirely on who is defining those terms in order to refuse custom and for what reason they might be doing it (as scotroutes intimates.)

Banks should be ethical, They are not the arbiters of morality.

Agree Kelvin, though my point stands that the new Twitter isn’t publishing things that you wouldn’t find in other media such as the Telegraph, DM, Talk (SHOUT!) TV etc.

It is also still a platform for left wing or centrist viewpoints, (unlike the other media I mentioned) and in that respect could be said to represent a greater diversity of views than other outlets.

I guess I’m becoming more tolerant as I age! It’s all to easy to throw rocks at the other side (I’ve thrown a few in my time) but it’s becoming tiresome.

I work in the Arts sector where the groupthink, censoriousness and virtue signalling has reached a level of absurdity that I find far more troubling that the things that Elon Musk is doing at Twitter.

I was obviously wrong with my share price comment though I’ll maintain that Musk isn’t too concerned about the company’s value. Despite the technical mess he is making of the site, no competing platforms have managed to take advantage of any of the weed fuelled, spur of the moment decisions that Elon makes.

That in itself points to the fact that Twitter has a virtual monopoly in its domain. Within a few years, Twitter will be at least as valuable as it was when Musk bought it (and profit wasn’t even the reason he bought the platform).

To be fair Kelvin,  that post could have been written by Douglas Murray at The Spectator, or a number of the hacks at the Daily Telegraph…

I’m not sure that Musk cares too much about the Twitter share price and I don’t think Twitter is about to collapse any time soon. He is achieving what he wants with the platform and can afford to take a short to medium term hit financially.

I’ve made sarky comments about him myself on this thread, including the comparison to Truth Social but in reality, what Musk has done to Twitter has made TS redundant. Truth Social was formed as a reaction to certain people being banned from Twitter, a reason that no longer exists.

I also think there are valid criticism to be made of how Twitter was run under the previous ownership.

The Croydon facelift? (Hair pulled into a really tight ponytail on the top of the head).

Bloody he’ll, I’m 57 and Glastonbury is making me feel young.

Bad taste maybe but utterly profound.

The Del-Boys’ of deep sea diving.

The Trotters’ Titanic Tousism Company.

Well, Wizkid seems to be smashing it on ‘the other’ stage, (listening on radio) Got bored of the Artic Monkeys so switched over,

Wizkid bringing a full live band, wonderful musicianship and plenty of Fela Kuti vibes.

“If he’s Blair on steriods, where’s his bigger, angrier, earthier Prescott?”

Angela Rayner?

“I reckon that Labour might have serious problems mobilising activists during the next general election campaign to do all the hard and very boring work which is absolutely vital and often erroneously dismissed as unimportant.”

That is a good point, for all the talk about the influence of mainstream and social media on politics, boots on the ground is vital and takes up an enormous portion of the workload, as someone pointed out on another political thread a couple of weeks back.

Starmer might find it hard to mass the troops but then again, it’s not like they will be outnumbered on the doorsteps by Tory canvassers.

On the charisma front, at least when you start at the bottom the only way is up and when facing the public, I expect Sunak to have more problems than Starmer in this regard, he is so out of touch, for him the only way is down.

I expect Laboir to loose a few votes to the Liberals but the Tories will lose more. If the left stay at home then they’ll get what they deserve I guess…

I wonder how many of those who say they are dissatisfied with Starmer are from the left, and will probably end up voting Labour anyway.

The optics of being the opposition leader are difficult, you don’t get the air time or the visual context of being surrounded by the trappings and ornaments of office. Even Corbyn came across a lot better than expected in 2017 once he had the exposure that a GE campaign offers.

Once they’re out on the stump, I can see Sunak getting eviscerated by Starmer whatever the date. Wherever he goes, Rishi’s aides will have a map showing the whereabouts of the nearest fridge.

I was joking cougar,  I just thought it was amusing that you had cited that character in a conversation about identity… perhaps unwittingly.  But who needs wit when you’ve got a barrage of insults at your fingertips eh?

Of course I understand that Ali G is a fiction. Much like the concept of self identification.

Perhaps the cat in this conversation belongs to Schrodinger

Seeing as Ali G self identifies as a black man, if we don’t acknowledge him as such would that make us racist?

Bit whatever you do, don’t call him ‘cis’.

“I see the distractions being cranked up inevitably… So far we have “we need more stop and search”, because nothing cheers a tory up quite like harrassing black kids. EXCEPT bullying trans kids in schools. So why not both?”

That the Tories seek to pick on minorities is nothing new but I find it interesting how little the trans issue has been discussed, either on mainstream media or more particularly on here,. Especially considering how trans women cyclists have been so succesfull in the women’s category recently, (and this is a cycling forum after all) .

It’s almost as if the topic it’s too hot a potato to handle, much easier to ascribe any questioning of the situation to being far right nonsense. Which might be exactly what the Tories hope happens, because they know that like Brexit, it is an issue that crosses party lines and there are grounds to be made there.

Yes, the right wing media will cream their pants on the stop and search issue but any political capitol on the race issue has long been expended and I seriously doubt that the suggestion to ramp up stop and search will affect anyone’s voting intentions.

On the other hand, trans issues could affect people’s voting patterns, especially when you look at the population breakdown beyond the axis of  left and right. Labour knows this and thats why they, (like the rest of us) are a bit scared to talk about it at the moment. Looking over the pond, it could be the issue that sinks Biden in 2024, especially if the Republicans end up selecting DeSantis.

“thus the whole exercise in putting the signs up in the first place is completely pointless”

But extremely profitable for sign makers, especially those with a mate on the local council.

And come to think of it, has anybody ever obeyed, or ever observed anyone else obeying a ‘cyclists dismount’ sign?

“It’s fair to say that the two party system is rotten to the core though.”

Have to agree with you about a potential path to PR opening up over the next few years. That it could go either way (as you say) has always been a worry for me though because there was a silver lining in the way the system managed to prevent the far right from gaining seats in Parliament.

That silver lining no longer exists now that the Conservatives have morphed into what is essentially a far right party.

The current silver lining that I’m holding on to is that should Labour fail to win an overall majority they will most likely form a coalition with the Lib Dems, whose price will surely be another stab at proportional representation.

I would be equally happy with either a Labour government or a Lib, Lab pact. A win, win as it were..

“I am a huge fan of flip-flops, although not of political flip-floppers.”

Then it looks like you’re exactly the sort of customer the Conservative Party shop has in mind…

“but I have noticed a lot of good looking young women on the right of the spectrum these days,”

Do you think it’s because the Tories have started promoting young women because of their looks rather than their talents to appeal to randy old pervs like you Jambo?

I can’t say for sure but the correlation between looks and the ability to spout vacuous nonsense persuades me somewhat, as more and more Fox News floozie types and **** Barbies are wheeled out by the right over here.

I’m not suggesting there’s necessarily any quid pro quo arrangements behind their appointments either, though I suspect the phrase “good looking filly’ does the rounds in the Conservative paddock when it comes to seeking out young ‘talent’ for the future.

I am a better cyclist because of Ogmios.

Just watched a 10 minute clip of the Vinivius Juniour incodent on YouTube to se the full context.

Perhaps the most appalling thing of all was the behaviour of the Valencia players. When Vini confronted the crowd, the Valencia players took every opportunity to exploit the situation and get him sent off and they succeeded.

They acted entirely in concert with the racist fans.

tj,

I don’t know where you live and how safe the seat you live in is or not but I’ve voted not for Labour twice. Didn’t make any difference to the outcome though as I happen to live in the Socialist Republic of Manchester and because of our voting system, my contribution or not made little difference.

I’m hoping for a hung parliament, Lib / Lab pact and a motion towards electoral reform and proportional representation. If this were to be achieved, I might even call it a Brexit bonus…

Ultimately, those who start a revolution rarely get what they wanted. The Brexit revolutionaries have achieved nothing constructive, rather like the MAGA mob in America, (Even Tucker Carlson says so). Perhaps ironically, the Brexit vote may have made it more likely that electoral reform can be achieved.

And to my mind, electoral reform would be a constructive thing. More constructive than had we stayed in Europe? Potentially yes.

“I do note that Starmer is making more positive noises about the EU now but still refusing to actually say he will do anything of significance”

I want him to say as little as possible on the matter, anything he says will be taken down and used as evidence against him by the right wing press. Even the Lib Dems aren’t pushing too hard with Europe questions.

Both Labour and the Lib Dems are banking on the public to trust them to do a better job of negotiating with Europe than the current shower and leaving it at that for now.