Once everyone is able to have a bank account and access to a bank branch, the second legislative step to be taken will be to ensure that everyone has access to personalized banking services at a reasonable distance from wherever they live. Also, the legitimacy of branch closings must be monitored more specifically by setting up a justification procedure with an impartial public consultation mechanism that will hear the people representing the affected communities and which will apply whenever a bank wants to close a branch. It should be accompanied by sanctions, including the establishment of compensation for those communities, as the ca ...[+++]se may be; a mechanism for the evaluation of the quality of services offered by the banks to the population which would come into play in the case of operations like bank mergers; finally, regulations concerning minimum banking hours during which counter service will be offered.

Technology, for example, is making many bank and credit union branches less economic, but most Canadians still want to be able to go to a branch to transact their business.

Some time in the future, we're going to have to explain to a new generation that there was a time when people used to go to a bank branch to purchase a service, and they'll say “Well, what's a bank branch?”

They value the strengths of Canada's national banking system, the stability and financial soundness of banking institutions, and the presence of local bank branches providing a broad range of services.

Where the ECB carries out the tasks conferred on it by this Regulation with regard to a group of credit institutions that is not less significant on a consolidated basis, it should carry out those tasks on a consolidated basis with regard to the group of credit institutions and on an individual basis with regard to the banking subsidiaries and branches of that group established in participating Member States.

From a local point of view, provisions for reinvestment in the community such as those in the bill introduced by my colleague, which we intend to introduce again through amendments to the banking bill, would also mean that representatives of the community could meet annually with managers of the bank branch in their neighbourhood or region to discuss the contribution it was making to the community, look for ways of improving things and identify mutually interesting projects that the community's deposits could be used to fund.