Andrew Irvine
In a spectacular fail, NAB chief executive Andrew Irvine told a falsehood in a radio interview yesterday on NAB’s record on branch closures.
Asked by 3AW mornings host Tom Elliott, “Do you intend to keep all of your branches open?”, Irvine replied:
“Well, I can tell you that I personally think branches are an essential part of the banking proposition and I think we’re gonna have branches for a very long time to come.
“In the six months I’ve been CEO, I haven’t shut a branch.”
This claim is simply wrong. Massively wrong.
Banking Day checked in with Dale Webster, an independent journalist who has meticulously scrutinised the records of all banks on branch closures, especially in the bush, over many years.
Over the last six months, Webster says, NAB and Irvine have shut branches in Mullumbimby, Cessnock, Moruya, Yass, Bright, Pittsworth, Lithgow, Oberon, Proserpine and Sarina - all after he started in April.
Ross McEwan, Irvine’s predecessor, was unashamed in closing branches in the face of public and political pressure.
The fact is NAB’s determination to push ahead with a program of bank branch closures is one of its points of difference from its peers.
Andrew Irvine must know this.
Alternatively, is the NAB CEO badly briefed? Or badly advised when it comes to strategic communications and public relations?
Whichever, this 3AW interview yesterday is a terrible look for NAB’s still pretty new CEO.