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--:-- John Bickley: A new trend has conservatives in the U.S. and abroad sounding the alarm for the sake of free speech. De-banking. Several banks and financial entities have recently refused service to people and organizations over their political views. And even some high-profile figures have been caught up in the process. In this episode, we talk to Sir Jacob Rees-Mogg, a member of British Parliament, about the debanking trend in the U.K. and abroad and what action he's proposing to address it.
--:-- John Bickley: I'm Daily Wire Editor-in-Chief John Bickley with Georgia Howe. It's Saturday, August 12th, and this is an extra edition of Morning Wire. Joining us now to discuss the debanking debate in the UK is Sir Jacob Rees-Mogg, a conservative member of Parliament and the host of State of the Nation on GB News.
--:-- Georgia Howe: Jacob, welcome.
--:-- Sir Jacob Rees-Mogg: Thank you for having me.
--:-- John Bickley: Just over a week ago, the head of NatWest Bank was forced to resign after it was revealed that she discussed a private client's banking details with a BBC reporter. That client was Nigel Farage. Most here in the US know him as the architect of Brexit. Can you tell us what happened there?
--:-- Sir Jacob Rees-Mogg: Yes, Nigel Farage was told by his bank, which was the bank of the late queen, most distinguished bank in the United Kingdom, that they were no longer willing to give him an account. The head of NatWest, which owns Cootes, then told the BBC that this was because he didn't have enough money. But he, very cleverly, this is Nigel, used a data access request to find out the real reason. And they'd had a very long committee meeting that had said that they didn't like his political opinions. Actually, one of the things they didn't like about him was he was a friend of Donald Trump. So being a friend of a former president of the United States means you get debanked in the United Kingdom.
--:-- Georgia Howe: Now, it's not just Farage. Other customers appear to have had their access to banking cut off. For example, Reverend Richard Fothergill says he had his bank account shut down after he complained about the bank's promotion of LGBT ideology. Can you tell us about other instances that you've heard of in this debanking trend?
--:-- Sir Jacob Rees-Mogg: Well, since Nigel Farage's case, a number of people have come forward and they have been charities that have been advocating views that aren't necessarily mainstream views, but are perfectly legal. And a free speech organization about a year ago had its facilities taken away by PayPal. So that was the first time anyone had heard of it. And that created quite a fuss at the time and PayPal relented. But it's gradually emerged that this is more and more of a problem. And Nigel Farage has set up a website for people to contact him to say, I too have been debanked. And he tells me he is getting hundreds and hundreds of messages.
--:-- John Bickley: After the closing of Farage account with Coutts Bank and the subsequent scandal even Prime Minister Rishi Sunak expressed his concern that people bank accounts were being shut down because of their political opinions. We've seen apparent examples of this in the US and Canada as well. How common is debanking in Western countries?
--:-- Sir Jacob Rees-Mogg: Well, I think it's become more of a problem. And I've heard about cases from the United States that Chase Manhattan has closed bank counts down. And it seems that if you don't hold politically correct views, you can be closed down on the basis of ESG, essentially, environment, social and governance, which I used to be an investment manager, and it was coming in whilst I was still active. And it's actually a means of not investing to make money, but investing to promote your political opinions. And this seems to meet a fail in its fiduciary duty if you are an investor or if you're on the board of an endowment or a charity. But it also means that you will say that you won't invest in things like defence. And this becomes really serious because one of the other things that's been in the British newspapers in the last few days is that defence companies that are supplying arms to Ukraine haven't been getting the investment they need because of ESG.
--:-- Georgia Howe: So ESG is something that has repeatedly come up on this show. Why do these banks believe they should be involved in social engineering and not just the business of money? Is it ultimately these ESG scores?
--:-- Sir Jacob Rees-Mogg: Well, it's been promoted by the regulators. So the Financial Conduct Authority, which is part of the regulatory system for banks, has encouraged them to sign up to ESG. And it's interesting because ESG started as something relatively informal. It wasn't compulsory. It was just a statement that you would bear these things in mind. And then it evolved into something that had regulatory approval and became a standard that you were expected to apply. And then if people weren't doing what you said, you took away investment from them or financial service facilities. So I think there is a regulatory issue here. And then, of course, there is a corporate culture that seems to be putting the desire to appear to be behaving politically correctly ahead of actually making money. Though sometimes this is pretty shameless because if you look at HSBC, HSBC adopts ESG when it's in the UK, but it's quite happy when it's in China to do business with some pretty unsavory people.
--:-- John Bickley: On a government level, I know you've been heavily involved in this and you're an influential member of parliament. You've introduced legislation to stop this kind of practice. Can you explain what you're seeking to do?
--:-- Sir Jacob Rees-Mogg: Yes, I've introduced an amendment to a bill going through Parliament to ensure that banks cannot take away banking facilities for people because they disagree with them. It essentially a freedom of speech amendment to protect consumers. But banking is such a heavily regulated industry that it's not like providing ordinary services. If you are a baker and you don't like your neighbor, you don't have to sell your neighbor a cake. But if you are a bank that is effectively regulated by the state and indeed bailed out by the state, then you shouldn't be imposing your political views on your customers. And banking in the UK, as you probably know, and your listeners probably know, is heavily concentrated. It's not as competitive as it is in the United States. They're in a small number of banks that provide a UK-wide service. And therefore, if you are debanked, it can be very hard to get service from anybody else.
--:-- Georgia Howe: How does your amendment seek to ensure that underhanded practices aren't used? We've seen various sort of discrete forms of redlining in banks, quietly blacklisting individuals or entities. How do you ensure that doesn't happen?
--:-- Sir Jacob Rees-Mogg: Well, you start with the assumption that the banks will by and large try to obey the law. So you make it clear in law that they're not allowed to take away banking facilities for people whose political views they don't like. And then it's the provision of information. Initially, Nigel Farage was told by Cootes that they were taking away his account and that they wouldn't say why. And they were only giving him 30 days notice. What my legislation would do would raise that to 90 days, but insist that the banks give a reason. And what's interesting with the NatWest scandal, the banking scandal, is that as soon as the reason became apparent, everybody thought it was wrong. And therefore, the bank has had to change its mind and is now offering Nigel Farage's facilities back. So openness is a key way of ensuring that the law would be followed.
--:-- John Bickley: What about other forms of business? Do you see trends in other industries that are also troubling that are similar to debanking?
--:-- Sir Jacob Rees-Mogg: Well, I think it is an issue across politics at the moment that there are views that you are not encouraged to hold, that people who were sceptical about lockdowns have found that those views weren't politically correct, that people who question the green agenda have been told that those views aren't suitable. So there are areas, and the whole trans debate is extremely toxic, and people have to tread very carefully there to avoid being deplatformed or having protests against them, and so on. So this has been a creeping problem. And you're so lucky in the United States, I can't tell you how jealous I am of the First Amendment, that absolute protection you've got of freedom of speech, which we don't have in this country. And therefore, we are constantly trying to bolster freedom of speech from my political point of view.
--:-- Georgia Howe: Yeah, for the sake of our largely American audience here, can you discuss the differences between the U.S. and the U.K., where you have no First Amendment protection? Do you have to address free speech laws issue by issue? How does that play out practically?
--:-- Sir Jacob Rees-Mogg: I would love to have a conversation about the difference in our two constitutions, because I think the US and the UK have the two most beautifully constructed constitutions in the world both of which have a very serious problem which is the mirror image of each other. Ours does not have enough protections and therefore we have no equivalent of the First Amendment but we have a very strong historic tradition of freedom of speech and we have absolute freedom of speech in Parliament. So as an MP in Parliament I can say anything even if it's in front of a court or in other ways restricted and that's very important. So MPs have a role in this country in maintaining freedom of speech particularly against the mob if there is a mob mentality, which there has been on some issues recently. In the US, you've obviously got the First Amendment protection, but you've got a print media at any rate that is pretty much of the liberal turn of mind. And therefore, what they decide people ought to read is constrained. And so it's not that there's any legal impediment, it's just how the press operates. So you end up with similar difficulties to us, but from a different reason.
--:-- John Bickley: In general, in the UK, do you sense that this free speech debate is trending in a more conservative direction or more progressive?
--:-- Sir Jacob Rees-Mogg: I think in terms of freedom of speech, that people are realizing how dangerous this is. And that in the end, freedom of speech is important, whether you are on the left or the right of politics, because sometimes it will be your view that's unpopular and you need to be able to express it. Otherwise, how do you win elections, how do you convert people to that opinion? And we're also seeing that the collective opinion can be wrong. This has historically been true, that people have believed in all sorts of things historically, that as human knowledge evolves, we discover we're mistaken. But look at things like lockdowns, which were thought to be the wisest thing to do. Look at New Zealand and all the lockdowns New Zealand had, which then turned out to be a terrible mistake. And therefore, you've got to be open to freedom of speech to work out where you go next. And anything that stops freedom of speech deters the development of mankind.
--:-- Georgia Howe: Final question. From your perspective as an MP, is there anything you've found to be a crucial takeaway from your experience dealing with these high stakes issues?
--:-- Sir Jacob Rees-Mogg: Well, I think that's a crucial point. I think politicians should be braver. But what I've discovered in my not enormously long political career, but I went to Parliament in 2010, is that when you hold back, you find that actually you're failing as a politician. You need to speak out and express your views because you will often find that there is a significant number of people who share those views. I was in the Cabinet when we were agreeing to all the lockdowns in England, and it was done on a devolved basis. And looking back at it, I wish I'd been much more outspoken than I was against them. I was not enthusiastic about them. I thought they were a mistake, particularly after the first one. And I think it would have been better if I had been even more outspoken than I was. And I was quite clear, at least within cabinet circles, that I thought it was a mistake. And that once again comes back to the crucial freedom of speech.
--:-- John Bickley: Jacob, thank you so much for talking with us.
--:-- Sir Jacob Rees-Mogg: Thank you for having me.
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--:-- John Bickley: That was Jacob Rees-Mogg, and this has been an extra edition of Morning Wire.
