Regional Roundup: Papers watch local Northern Rock queues
Posted by
Martin Stabe
on 18 September 2007 at 17:18
Tags: Northern Rock, Regional Roundup
The run on Northern Rock continued to be the big story around the country today.
It was the big story for The Journal in Newcastle, of course. The paper has been campaigning to support the bank, auses which has given £175m to good causes in the area over the past decade. The paper is calling on its readers to open accounts at Northern Rock.
The North West Evening Mail, meanwhile, reassured good causes in Cumbria that their funding from the Northern Rock Foundation is safe.
Elsewhere around the country, some papers looked at the local impact as Northern Rock’s share price continued to collapse.
In Edinburgh, the Evening Times reported that one major local shareholder, the fund Baillie Gifford, had seen £250 million wiped from its investment.
The Eastern Daily Press reported that councils in its area were reassuring local council tax payers that public money invested in Northern Rock is safe. Norfolk County Council, along with South Norfolk, Breckland and Forest Heath district councils between them have £10 million invested with Northern Rock, the paper said. The Lincolnshire Echo had the same idea, revealing that Lincolnshire County Council, West Lindsey, East Lindsey and North Kesteven District Councils have a combined total of £10.5m invested in Northern Rock.
The Northern Echo’s Jim Entwistle has a profile of Northern Rock chief executive Adam Applegarth. “He has perhaps gained more column inches in the sports pages of The Northern Echo than he has the business pages,” Entwistle writes, noting that as captain of Sunderland Cricket Club, Applegarth had lead the team to the Foster’s North East Premier League Championship in 2000.
Elsewhere,from the Southern Echo, the
Standing out in the crowd reported by the the Yorkshire Post was Clive Hanover, from village near York, who held a sign saysing “I’m putting money in”, and told the paper he was depositing £10,000 “as a point of principle”.
The Nottingham Evening Post found a local man who had driven through the night from the south of France to withdraw his money.
The Belfast Telegraph looked south to queues in Dublin, and stressed that the bank’s 25,000 Irish customers were covered by the British government’s guarantee.
The Western Mail, meanwhile reported that Wales’ Principality Building Society has been forced to put on extra staff to deal with an influx of morgage applications and account openings in the wake of the crisis.
