Labour party manifesto pledges to renationalise energy, rail and Royal Mail

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4. Banking is a very important issue....

...because of the current drive by banks to shut local branches and make everything automated.

It's been driven by how the banks got stung over mis-selling PPI. The thinking being that if people mis-sold payment protection insurance in a bid to hit sales targets then the solution is to cut out the people.

This approach does cause problems for the customer. Many people, especially the elderly much prefer dealing with a member of staff face to face and don't trust online banking very much. A lot of people still don't have access to online banking.

Another issue here is financial advice. What happens when you need it? In times past you would have simply gone to your local bank manager. Now you are more likely to end up with independent financial advisers, who are not cheap, or in some cases going towards services such as payday loans that people would otherwise be dissuaded from using.