UK bank cancels top politician for views on gender, diversity ideologies
British politician Nigel Farage Tuesday revealed that his account with Coutts Bank was closed over his political views, including his support for President Trump and unvaccinated tennis champion Novak Djokovic.
Farage, one of the UK’s most popular Right-leaning figures, announced earlier this month that his accounts at Coutts Bank will be shut down this summer for undisclosed reasons. Three of Farage’s family members are reportedly suffering the same treatment. The Brexit mastermind believes he is being forced out of the country and revealed that he has since been rejected by nine other banks.
But according to internal documents leaked Tuesday, Coutts decided to “exit” Farage because he was not “compatible with Coutts given his publicly-stated views that were at odds with our position as an inclusive organisation.”
The decision was made at a November 17th meeting of Coutts’ Wealth Reputational Risk Committee. Meeting attendees were handed a 36-page dossier on Farage which showed an aggressive attempt to find a reason to cancel his account.
Farage had apparently not had an issue with his finances, because executives admitted that “[he] meets the [economic contribution] criteria for commercial retention.” Neither could the bank claim inappropriate behavior, because Farage, who the bank admitted is “professional, polite and respectful . . . has not made any inappropriate remarks to our staff and treats them professionally and with courtesy.”
Instead, the bank tried to tie Farage to Russia — the dossier reportedly mentions “Russia” 144 times — and claimed he held “pro-Putin views”. Still, it was forced to admit that “NF seemingly has no direct links to Russia.”
Then, Coutts executives tried to justify canceling Farage for supporting President Donald Trump:
“There is also adverse press relating to . . . endorsements of Donald Trump, including defending Trump’s ‘grab them by the pussy’ remarks as ‘locker room banter’ and stating that Trump was ‘not running to be Pope’. Adverse press shows that NF continues to support Trump despite the many new legal issues he faces.”
But the bank worried that Farage would accuse the bank of “taking political sides on this debate as the comments are not related to the Bank.”
The dossier then turned especially abrasive when it mentioned Farage's visit to world tennis champion Novak Djokovic, who was deported from Australia and banned by the Biden administration for refusing the COVID-19 injections. Farage criticized Australia for the decision during his visit. The bank called the visit “the spineless, chaotic behaviour of a chancer (petty opportunist)”.
Farage was also criticized for supporting InfoWars host Alex Jones.
Ultimately, the bank seemed to settle on Farage’s approach to gender and diversity ideologies as the justification they needed.
“However, when considering our stance specifically on ESG/diversity the comments/articles are not in line with our views or our purpose,” the document stated, defining ESG (environmental, social and governance] as supporting diversity and inclusion; black, Asian and minority ethnic (BAME) equality, LGBTQ rights and social mobility”.
“[A]t best he is seen as xenophobic and pandering to racists, and at worst he is seen as xenophobic and racist. He is considered by many to be a disingenuous grifter and is regularly (almost constantly) the subject of adverse media.”
The bank’s executives appeared to be satisfied with this, while admitting his speech on these ideologies “is done within the law, or framed with sufficient ambiguity to claim malicious misquoting by his critics.”
Because of this, the bank decided to place Farage on a “glide-path” to cancelation after he completed his mortgage payments — if he didn’t make a “harmful” statement first.
“Unless/until NF makes a statement that glorifies or promotes harmful behaviour, we need to consider his default, ambient reputation – which I agree is captured for many as ‘disingenuous grifter’. I agree we should consider exit to coincide with the end of the mortgage term and on a long glide-path that reduces the risk of counter-criticism.”
Other British banks have been canceling customers who do not support totalitarian gender ideology.
