A High Quality Loan Book

All secured against prime real estate

As we are now the formal owners of the Crock's loan book, it's a good moment to reiterate the assurances we have been given about its worth:

• FSA- "We believe [Northern Rock] is solvent, meets all capital requirements, and has a good quality loan book." (FSA chairman Callum McCarthy 17.9.07)
• Darling- "Bank of England lending is secured against Northern Rock's assets such as high quality mortgages, assessed by the Financial Services Authority as being of good quality" (21.01.08)
• Brown- "Most people agree that Northern Rock has a quite high-quality loan book and I can assure you that our aim in all of this is to secure the best deal for the British taxpayer." (20.01.08)

So that's alright then.

And certainly no need at all to worry about:

"NR's Mortgages in arrears topped £1bn in December - up by nearly a quarter on the position five months earlier. The number of mortgages in arrears also increased by nearly 20% between July and December to more than 9, 000 households.

Repossessions in December more than doubled over the previous month. Northern Rock had to take the keys to 237 properties, swelling its pool of repossessed homes to some 1,100. Properties with mortgages in excess of the value of the property have also been steadily rising - up by more than 10% in five months."

Or to trouble ourselves about Tyler's very interesting encounter last week with a young lady who until recently worked for a debt recovery/repossession firm up North. Whose prime customer is, well, waddyaknow... the Crock.

Hmmm... I wonder if we're maybe missing something here...