Osborne to sell off the Rock
James Forsyth 6:43pm
George Osborne will use his Mansion House speech tonight to, in the words of one source,
"fire the starting gun" on the sale of Northern Rock.
Robert Peston, who had the story first, reports that "The chancellor hopes that the sale of Northern Rock will send a powerful signal
that the banking industry is on a path back to more normal conditions, following the crisis of three years ago."
In an attempt to maximise return for the taxpayer, the whole of the "good bank" part of Northern Rock will be sold off to a single bidder. This means that the whole issue of discounted
bank shares, which splits Osborne and Cable, with the Chancellor in favour, doesn’t arise.
But I expect that Osborne’s speech tonight will be overshadowed by the Governor of the Bank of England’s remarks. Word has it that he will warn that Britain still has several more years
of hardship to come before the economy returns to health.
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David Lindsay
June 15th, 2011 7:34pm Report this commentWho the hell would buy it?
An ideal opportunity for remutualisation.
Sodium Haze
June 15th, 2011 7:36pm Report this commentbankers gave themselves a 36% pay increase in 2010 - sounds like business as usual to me!
http://sodiumhaze.blogspot.com/2011/06/who-gets-36-pay-increase.html
Noa.
June 15th, 2011 10:41pm Report this commentI thought for a moment that you were referring to Gibraltar.
But the now habitual positioning by the deliberate 'leakage' of government annoucements is one of the many depressing traits started by New Labour and continued by the Coalition.
John Montague
June 16th, 2011 2:32am Report this commentFor a while, just after the crisis, NR was the best place to put your money - a state guaranteed bank paying competitive rates. Then the EU complained ( fair enough, it really was unfair competition) And now? It still has plenty of loyal customers, but does anybody know how tainted the brand is? I wonder what Martin thinks.
anne allan
June 16th, 2011 10:48am Report this commentSo, let me get this clear.
As a taxpayer I have already contributed a hefty sum for bailing out this blasted bank.
As a share holder, say by having a pension fund, I will be paying again for something I already own.
Hmmm..........
bojimbo
June 16th, 2011 2:16pm Report this commentSo , the Rocks bosses will be inline for bonuses .
TomTom
June 16th, 2011 2:56pm Report this commentHad British Deposit Insurance not been a measly £2000 I doubt people would have had to organise a run on the Bank to protect their savings. Just why was the FSA, Bank of England, and H M Treasury so far behind the times on offering PROPER protection to depositors ?
RCE
June 16th, 2011 3:05pm Report this commentWould anyone care to bet that they don't completely screw this up?
TrevorsDen
June 16th, 2011 3:42pm Report this commentI only caught a snippet of Ed Balls' speech today.
But the bit I caught I swear I heard him say that labour would have halved the 'debt' over 4 years.
If I heard right then he's at it again.
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