Shire of Carnamah welcomes Federal inquiry into regional bank closures as town prepares to farewell Westpac

A Federal Senate inquiry into bank closures across Australia has been welcomed by the Shire of Carnamah as the Mid West town, along with many across the country, grapple with the impact of losing their local branch. A motion to investigate the impact of bank closures in regional communities, and possible solutions, was moved by Queensland LNP Senator Gerard Rennick on February 8 and passed without debate. The move comes after years of decline in the number of regional bank branches. According to the 2021 Regional Banking Taskforce, branch numbers in regional Australia dropped from 2500 to 1900 between June 2017 and June 2021. Carnamah became one victim of this trend in October 2022, when Westpac announced it would be closing the only branch in town. Since the announcement, the council has called on Westpac to stay and ran a survey showing the majority of residents used the branch weekly. “Council congratulates Senator Rennick on his motion which will hopefully enable some light being shed on the improper way banks are treating rural and regional communities across Australia,” Shire president Merle Isbister said in a statement. With the branch set to close on February 24, people will soon have to travel 120km to the closest bank in Moora. Cr Isbister said a moratorium on branch closures should be in place until the investigation’s findings were published in December this year. “Then the banks will be forced to acknowledge the impact branch closures have on our rural and regional communities,” she said. The Shire president also accused Westpac of purposefully leaving Carnamah in February to avoid future laws which would require banks to assess the impacts of bank closures and require them to give clear reasons for closures. “Clearly banks like Westpac have cynically actioned the current flurry of branch closures across Australia before the impact assessment ‘processes’, as required by the Regional Banking Taskforce, are established in mid-2023,” Cr Isbister said.