According to the chancellor, troubled
mortgage lender
Northern Rock will start to offer new
mortgage loans . The
lender, which was nationalised a year ago, closed its books for
new
mortgage customers and even pushed customers away to try and
shrink their
loan book.
However, Darling has shifted the priorities for the
bank in order to try and return
mortgage lending to healthy levels and restructure the stricken
mortgage
industry in the UK.
Darling was reported on BBC Radio Four as commenting: Foreign
banks have withdrawn from the market. What I want to do is use
Northern Rock to fill that gap. The news follows a call from
Gordon Brown to ban
100 per cent mortgages .
