Councillors are calling on Barclays bank to reveal what its plans are to maintain a presence in their town.

Barclays has announced it is closing Leyburn and Bedale branches, a move which leaves the whole of Wensleydale without a high street bank after Hawes closed several years ago.

Bedale town councillors were told an online meeting is being held this week with Barclays managers after protests from local people over the closure of the town’s last bank. The nearest one is in Northallerton seven miles away.

Clerk Nick Reed said it would cause issues for the council, which relies on the bank during the annual bonfire event and at other times to deposit cash.

He said while they could do that at Northallerton it was not the same as having the branch on the doorstep.

In its closure announcement, the bank said it had only 17 regular customers using the branch in Bedale. Mayor councillor Amanda Coates said there were doubts about this and Barclays should carry out a survey over the week to see how many people did use it.

“There always seems to be a queue when I go in,” she told members.

Deputy Mayor Councillor John Howe said that Barclays figures about the numbers of people using the bank had been disputed in Leyburn. He added: “They said they intend to maintain a presence in Bedale, we need to know what that is."

Clerk Nick Reed said he had written to Barclays outlining the concerns and th bank had agreed to hold an online meeting this week.

Cllr Coates said: “A lot of people moved their banking to Barclays, when HSBC closed in the town, because they were able to go into the bank. I have been talking to a big business about moving business there and I am going to have to say 'don’t bother because it is not going to be there'. You can bank at any bank and I wouldn’t personally choose Barclays now. If people go to other towns to do their banking they will do their shopping there as well, it all has a knock-on effect.”

Councillor John Noone added: “What rankles with me is that we stopped using HSBC because they moved to Northallerton and Barclays was on the doorstep and within two years they move. The main thing for us as a town is what is this new presence going to be? Is it the Post Office? When you consider this town and Aiskew and the villages, our population has more than doubled in the last 30 years and here we are with less and less services.”

Barclays said Bedale will close on April 26 with Leyburn following on May 5.