Mr Katter said ANZ’s failure to reach an agreement with Australia Post about its Bank@Post services reinforced how urgently the Federal Government needed to purchase one of the smaller banks.

“We believe that the Federal Government now has to purchase one of the smaller banks and if ever there is a group of people that need a policeman on the block, it’s the banking fraternity,” Mr Katter said.

“The Commonwealth Bank provided a benchmark and were effectively the policeman seeing that everyone was doing the right thing, but by selling the Commonwealth, the Federal Government at the time got themselves up to $20,000 million – enough money to buy their way through next election.”

Mr Katter said it was one of the worst things that had ever happened in Australian political history.

“People like Ben Chifley and Ted Theodore would spit upon so-called Labor politicians who were responsible for that decision,” he said.

The change for ANZ customers came into effect last night and follows ANZ’s decision to close 63 branches last year, including 40 in regional Australia.

There are reportedly 900 small business customers across Australia who use Bank@Post regularly and do not have an ANZ branch within 20 kilometres of their local post office.