A number of high-profile, politically exposed persons (PEPs) – including Members of Parliament amongst other political leaders – have had their private bank accounts closed over the past few months in in the United Kingdom.
The most high-profile example is Brexit leader Nigel Farage, who was “debanked” by Coutts Bank last month because of his close relationship to former President Donald Trump, appearances on InfoWars, and comments on political movements such as LGBT pride and Black Lives Matter.
But it’s not just Farage on the Chinese-style social credit chopping block. Multiple other PEPs have experienced similar, arbitrary action, including Brexiteer and leader of the Reform Party, Richard Tice; Member of the House of Lords and prominent Brexiteer Baroness Claire Fox; podcast hosts Konstantin Kisin and Frances Foster; writer Toby Young; and current British Chancellor of the Exchequer Jeremy Hunt.
British politicians have criticized the increasingly common move to restrict the ability of their colleagues to perform basic life functions such as opening a bank account, and have demanded action to prevent it from reoccurring. Prime Minister Rishi Sunak reacted to the Farage scandal: “This is wrong. No one should be barred from using basic services for their political views. Free speech is the cornerstone of our democracy.”
“In our increasingly cashless society, this is a brutally effective way of cancelling someone and is bound to have a chilling effect on free speech. Like many of the most fiendish forms of censorship, it was invented by the Chinese Communist party,” argues Toby Young.
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