The Rock was a good business, as the annual reports showed. It was wrecked by the Bank of England's decision a year ago, since abandoned, to increase compulsory reserves by 50 per cent. The arrangements to facilitate this were mishievously reported by the BBC and a run resulted.

G Gardiner, Swindon, UK

There was time when the standards of Westminster meant something, now they mean nothing, no grubby deal or gross incompetence is enough to fall on ones sword. Move the parliament to a theme park somewhere in Scotland they will be in their element and will not further defile Westminster tradition

Peter, Tal, France

I wonder if this company had been called Southern Rock with it's head office's in a southern Tory seat the government would have been so quick to throw taxpayers money at it.

jim, Sutton,

Given that Northern Rock specialised in negative equity (125%) mortgages to people who were penniless, it should be hardly surprising that it would make massive losses. Darling's actions in nationalising these losses are criminal.

Paul, Coventry,

This Labour Government has all but destroyed this Country in the past 11 years, and on top of that has got us into 2 conflicts that we should not be involved in. The other problem is that there really is no one that inspires confidence in either Tories or Lib Dems.

malcolm, london, uk

One-off expenses £165m.... 37m for 2000 redundancies equates to only £18,500 each (with available jobs dwindling).

City 'advisers' get £35.6m ( seems about right! ) - and where's the remaining £93m?

Hundreds of these homeless defaulters will have children - this is a mega social nightmare.

Shirley Bowen, Blackpool, UK

A political scorched-earth policy. Labour know they're going to lose the next election badly, so they're doing as much damage to Britain as they can in order to make life as hard as possible for the next government. Every decision they make between now & the election will be designed to harm the UK.

Mike, Brighton,

Presumably those former Shareholders who are agitating for "compensation" will stump up the £3 billion out of anything they are awarded?

Alan Hargreaves, Holywell, UK

So the govt owns all the equity and all the debt? Seniority of claim are kind of irrelevant then aren't they? If the bank goes bust, debt is equity and equity is debt, where they're all held by the same person (but try telling that to a PE buyout firm!).

Alex, London,

How ON EARTH can Labour secure even 1% of votes in the next General Election? Could even 1 out of 100 people be stupid enough not to see through their utter incompetence & inability to run this country? Fire them and sue for taxpayers compensation. This is heartbreaking and shameful.

Ann, London,

Richard Branson was more than willing to put his money in to save the bank, but the government got greedy and now it's back firing, so instead of just the shareholders loosing out the tax payers are too !!!

s thurston, skegness,

If Northern Rock are paying back their loan faster than expected, then why should Darling throw away another £3Bn of taxpayer's money? This is all crazy economics and the sooner we are shot of NuLab, the country will start the long road to recovery after 11 years of maladministration by Blair&Brown.

Melchet, Edinburgh, UK

I seriously think that Brown, Bliar, Darling and all of the Cabinet are traitors to this country and should be treated as such. They have systematically destroyed us economically far better than any wartime enemy.

Albert Hall, kettering,

What's the alternative? Let Northern Wreck go bust? Gordon goofed when he decided to end the Bank of England's supervision of other banks. It had worked pretty well since 1781, but Gordon knew better. Now, the damage is done - we just have to grit our teeth and pay up.

Frank Upton, Solihull,

NR only lost £585M so the CE must be in line for a massive fat cat bonus

Fred, Moray, Scotland

s that they are squeaky clean and honest.. But the English strut around Europe with their mightier than though attitude whilst the mot corrupt government in Europe further continues to lower standards and ignore their responsibilities.

Peter, Tal, France

i beleive Sandler's background is insurance - why has the government appointed him to run (down) a bank?

David, London,

Any Chancellor who is willing to write off more than the annual defence budget to save a private company should be sacked .
Presumably he hasn't been because the P M was behind the decision which leaves only the electorate to give them a vote of no confidence.Crewe and Glasgow did just that.

Ricky Steedman, Edinburgh, Scotland

the government should try to encourage saving, not spending, ah but whom should we trust with our savings?

peter c, devizes, wessex

The system has failed, and Darling is trying to preserve it.

Peter, Berlin, Germany

Around 20,000 of our elderly died last winter; what an immoral bunch.

elena, barnsley, uk

Where did Alastair Darling have his mortgage when NR was nationalised? And where does he have his mortgage now?

isabella, london,

OK, hands up anyone that honestly didn't see THAT one coming !!

This is a scandal of the very highest order - nothing more than a £3 billion theft of taxpayers money. There should be an independant, public enquirey !!

Don't know about sacked, Darling should be arrested !!

Andy R, worthing, UK

Why are we still debating about this empty suit Darling?

And when is the total fallacy that Gordon Brown was a "great" chancellor going to be fully exposed? Funny how you only ever hear this from labour sycophants.

Robert, Warfield, England

Seems that there will be less and less jam tomorrow whilst tomorrow gets further and further away. All so predictable from politicians who are incapble of understanding what they are in charge of whilst having no useful experience of running even a whelk stall.

Richard, West Midlands,

This fiasco has shown yet again that our politicians should only be allowed into office providing they have the necessary skills and work experience to make such decisions. No body at the Treasury has a clue. This is a national disgrace; its theft of tax payers' money.

Paul, West Midlands,

It seems a small amount. I wonder if some of your contributers remember Tory Chancellor Lamont losing £15 Billion pounds in one day.

jim, Consett, UK

Yet more lies from Labour, why should we trust them? It is even more sickening when you add up all the recent wasted billions at a time when we are all being taxed at record levels. Makes me very disappointed with our political élite.

Daz, Basingstoke, UK

Who does Alastair Darling think he is??.... A Fund Manager? It is easy to invest other peoples' money and have no responsibility for it. And when Northern Rock finally goes to the wall, this government will just write it off with no-one to blame.

louis, Liverpool, UK

Northern Rock SHOULD haunt Chancellor Darling: it's his critical blunder. He orated about what to do - nothing - then lacked the backbone to do it. So banks, building societies, backbenchers, businesses and unions know they're dealing with a wimp and walk all over him.

He should be sacked.

Noel Falconer MEcon, COUIZA, France

Were we not told when this money was lent that we would get it back. This government are nothing but liars, & after this, surely a general election must be immediate. To lie to the tax payers about this amount of money is surely fraud!

Pete, St Albans, England

I wonder how much taxpayers are going to pay so Labour can try & retain votes in its northern heartland. The Northern Rock should have been left to fail. It tried to expand through a fiscally dangerous policy & failed: businesses that do that shd go to the wall. Anywhere else the Govt wld've let it.

Donna Walker, Effingham, England

The Government should cut it losses and let Northern Rock sink into oblivion or call a general election now..

Richard, Bucharest,

What an absolute disgrace. I hope all those that voted Labour in at the last election take note of this. Financial incompetence of this nature will bring this country to its knees.

Simon Booker, London, UK

This is not real is it? No commercial outfit would swap debt for equity in such a wobbly outfit on a 1:1 basis. At best the existing ordinary shareholders should be diluted back to peanuts. But, this is crazy. Northern Rock should have been left to the fate of the market.

JR, Portishead,

Labour must go, maybe we should take the losses out of the MP's pension fund, the government had no problem raiding my pension fund last time it was short of cash, now there's nothing left, so lets raid theirs!

MR W Jones, Liverpool, England

Just shows what the governmennt think of our armed forces, they will write of £3bn for a small bank but not give the forces the hardware to save the lives of the personnel on the ground.

Chris Makin, Caernarfon,

"Best way to meet Government objectives..." I think Darling means Labour party objectives which have never ever had the best for the tax payer or electorate as a priority.

It's a Labour Bank in a Labour heartland and the electorate has been stung for 50 billion GBP to shore up the vote.

Marc, Singapore,

£27 b owed, minus £9 b repayed selling good loans, leaves £21 b (inc the extra £3 b) on a loan book valued at £18 b.
The next repayment probably another £9 b will be the average risk rated loans with less margin returned. The final £12 b will be virtually written off as no other bank will want them

Joe, Geelong, VIC Australia

What on earth is this man up to scoring yet another own goal?
Its as if self destruction is the aim of the PM and Darling.

nilsey105, wigan,

Why a badly run business could not be allowed to fail is beyond me. Labour are wasting taxpayers' money with impunity and must be made to realise that such wanton profligacy shall not be tolerated. They have grown arrogant and seem only to be concerned with prolonging their stay in power.

Alan, Swindon,