MP asks banks to be more understanding

A Blackpool MP has taken up the cudgels on behalf of local hoteliers who claim their inflexible bank managers are putting many of them out of business.

Gordon Marsden, MP for Blackpool South, has written to banks in the area asking for assurances that they are not pursuing a policy of foreclosure on loans to small hotels, guesthouses and other businesses already hit by a poor season.

Many hotels were run by people without much previous experience in business, Marsden reminded the banks, and the casualty rate was always likely to be high. "In these circumstances it is all the more important that those institutions giving financial support, mortgages, etcetera to such businesses should have as measured and sympathetic a strategy as possible," he added.

"I am increasingly concerned that this is not always the case with some banks and other institutions in the Blackpool area - and that repossession and failure to give advance attention to problems of repayment that occur are often exacerbating the situation."

Marsden said his letter came in response to representations from local hotelier groups and "half a dozen" cases brought to his surgery.

Josie Hammond, secretary of the Blackpool Hotel and Guest House Association, said a lot of small hotels were having a lean time because of the bad weather, the World Cup and the strong pound. But banks were compounding the problem with their lack of understanding.

The banks needed to look at cases individually rather than operate a blanket policy, she added. Hotels taking steps to bring in new business should be helped, while those "just sitting there with the vacancy sign and very little else" should not.

Marsden said he would be meeting with two of the banks, which he declined to name, to discuss their policies further.

By David Shrimpton