18/07/2011 Look North (North East and Cumbria)

Welcome to Monday's Look North. In tonight's headlines, summertime in

Cumbria. Flash flooding damages homes and cause a bridge to

collapse. I'm just devastated. It's something you could not have

predicted. A tiny little stream doing this immense amount of damage.

An investigation's begun after a woman dies following a dive off the

Northumberland coast. Legal battle for the family who

lost a baby twin daughter. And no dough for Gregg's girl Helen.

She won't be Lord Sugar's business partner.

In sport, we'll round up the weekend's action. And Hartlepool,

here we come! Why Hangus and the lads could be performing in front

of a packed house at Victoria Park The full extent of damage caused by

severe flash flooding became clear to the residents of a Cumbrian

community today. A bridge collapsed and homes were damaged as a

normally small beck turned into a torrent of water. People living in

Great Corby near Carlisle, fear they could be forced to live

elsewhere for months while repair work is carried out. Our reporter

Alison Freeman is there for us now. Alison, tell us what happened.

this is a place which doesn't normally Flood and it was that

screen but was the cause of many of the problems. There was a downpour

in the afternoon which caused a lot of surface water but then the

bridges got caught with debris which caused the water to back up,

knocking this wall down, and sending water flooding into the

cottages which put behind us here. Further downstream, a bridge has

been completely knocked out of use. Today, I had been talking to the

people who live here. They tell me they can't believe what's happened.

The force at which the water came in his career. But almost as

quickly as it arrived yesterday afternoon, it sank away again. The

mess it has made us left the house holders believing it will be months

before they can live in the six affected homes again. Across the

road, at the primary school, 70 pupils missed out on the sports day

today. It burst its banks ripping up the new soft play ground

services, covering the area in more than 30 tons of silt. I am just

devastated. It is something you could not have predicted. A tiny

little stream doing this amount amount of damage. I can't believe

it. It's devastating. At the pub, the lack of gas meant no food could

be served today. Gas suppliers could be off until Thursday. But

the main concern here is the closed road. The collapsed bridge means

that pub is now in a dead-end with a landlady fears could be fatal for

business. From this road, we get 80% of our business. And from next

week, when the children break up, I was hoping for the tourists, the

cyclists, the Walkers, to come in but now they won't. They will delay

the tour and not hit this pub at all. What does that mean in real

terms? A worrying statement. It could mean the closure of the pub.

The Environment Agency says this was a freak event and simply shows

the complexities of planning for floods. I think in rural areas when

you get intense rainfall it's almost impossible to predict where

it might happen and almost impossible to stop it. But, for now,

all the villagers can do is assess the damage.

A total of six properties have been affected by the flooding. With me

now is the owner of one of those. Tell me a little bit about what you

found yesterday when you got home. We got back from town yesterday and

just couldn't believe it. It was absolutely awesome, in one way. All

the houses were completely flooded. I've never seen anything like it

before. It was horrendous. Is this something which has happen to you

before? No, and hopefully it will never happen again. One of the

gentle man who lives in the village he was well into his eighties, came

down yesterday and said he has lived here all of his life and is

said never happened before. It's just one of those things, flash

flooding can happen to anyone. Unfortunately, it happened to us

yesterday. You live with your family in this house. Where are you

going to go and when do you think you will be back? The we have the

insurance on the case. I think we will be out of the House for six

months. We will stay in a hotel and then we could go into rented

accommodation. It will take six or eight weeks to for the house to dry

out and then for it to be rewired and replastered. Thanks very much.

We know the editor of the tea is back on. The gas will be back on by

Thursday but there road closure no one knows when it will be up and

running again. -- the electricity is back on. Back to you.

The rest of the day's news now. A carer has appeared in court to deny

neglecting a dementia sufferer who died in an old people's home in

South Shields. Daphne Joseph from South Shields will go on trial next

year. She was arrested after an investigation at the Saint

Michael's View care home run by Southern Cross. Among the residents

was Joyce Wordingham, who suffered from Alzheimers and who died in

February last year. In a separate hearing, Sean Abbott, a care worker

from Gainsborough Avenue in South Shields, was accused of assault

charges in relation to four patients at the same home. They

were both granted bail. Three people have been charged with

invading a football pitch, following trouble at Darlington's

pre-season friendly with Newcastle on Friday night. A 21-year-old man

from Newcastle and a 22-year-old man from Gateshead will appear

before Darlington magistrates next Tuesday. A 17-year-old Darlington

youth will appear before the town's youth court next month.

A Cumbrian firm has been fined �90,000 after two workers suffered

life-threatening injuries when they were engulfed by a fireball at its

factory in Wigton. The prosecution was brought by the Health and

Safety Executive, following the fire at Innovia films in September

2006. The fire was caused by an electrical fault.

A woman who died during a diving expedition off the Northumberland

coast has been named. Doctor Ruth Fletcher, who was 60 years-old and

from the Stocksfield area of the county, surfaced unconscious during

a dive off the island of Longstone near Seahouses yesterday afternoon.

She was airlifted to hospital but soon after was pronounced dead by

doctors. Adele Robinson reports. A weekend diving trip turned to

tragedy. Dr Ruth Fletcher was a amongst a group of divers who had

been visiting a site next to the islands but yesterday at around

12:30pm she fell unconscious while surfacing from a dive. When she was

pulled out, she had no pulse. a tragedy. There's nothing you can

really say about it. Tragic circumstances. Everybody did their

level best to help this lady. Unfortunately, we couldn't do

anything this time. Emergency services were called and CPR was

carried out. A nearby helicopter winched dr Fletcher from the

harbour to the local hospital where she was pronounced dead.

Unfortunately, this is the first fatality in quite a long time

involving divers. The first one I have come across in 10 or 15 years.

It's believed Dr Ruth Fletcher had been diving 50 metres dialled and

at the Longstone aside six miles out. On her website, in broad and,

she is described as a keen sportswoman who has enjoyed

national success. Among her clinical interests listed were

medical examinations for divers and for the oil and gas industry. It's

still not known exactly what happened out there, but there are

obvious risks involved in deep diving and it is known as a

potential hazard the sport. It is a hazardous sport. People

participating need to be particularly careful. Great care

needs to be taken. Generally speaking, I think they have a

pretty high safety record now. We don't get the call-outs we used to

get some years ago but occasionally, unfortunately, an accident does

happen and when it does happen, it can be serious. The police say

inquiries are taking place to establish the exact circumstances

of the incident and a report is being prepared for the coroner.

They suffered the heartbreak of losing a baby. Now a couple from

Teesside are considering legal action against a hospital. Named

Rose, she was stillborn but her parents blame a delay in inducing

the birth. Her identical twin sister did survive. But the family

believe extra pressures on the maternity unit at the time may have

held up the delivery. Peter Harris reports.

Faith survived. But her parents struggle with knowing she should

have had an identical twin sister. At 38 weeks, Debbie had a scan and

says she was told the births would be induced that night or next day.

In the event, that didn't happen till after a weekend and Rose was

stillborn. We already bought two coats -- cots, double pushchair,

everything I've had to get rid of and it has not our fault at all.

It's just really hard. The James Cook Hospital carried out an

investigation into Rose's death. It says it tries to avoid inducing

babies in complicated situation that weekends because of a lack of

specialists staff but in these letters to the parents, it admits

the two-day delay in giving birth to Rose might have made a

The twins were born in 2009 at a time when the nearby Friarage

maternity unit in Northallerton was closed due to staff shortages. The

Trust declined to comment on the family claims this may have added

to pressures at Middlesbrough. They plan to sue. It's not about the

money. If we can help anybody else in the long run, in the future, and

save anybody else's children, well, then that will be enough for me.

Plenty more to come in tonight's Look North. Find out what's next

for the Gregg's girl who came runner up in the Apprentice. The

cocoa that went with Scott to the Antarctic and other chocolate

making history. And after that wild weekend weather Wise, the next few

days are looking more settled? No, not really. I will have more

details shortly. We're going to kick-off a new

series now, speaking to people from our region who have made a bit of

an impact. Appropriately enough, the first of our headliners is in

the media business. In fact, he's right at the heart of of everything

that's going on, right now in the world of newspapers and of politics.

If you follow the goings-on at Westminster, you will have heard

about and heard from Kevin Maguire, the Daily Mirror's political man

and associate editor has a column in the New Statesman magazine and

is a TV and regular radio host. In South Shields, he is great crack.

like getting out and meeting them. Asking them tricky questions. I

remember being told, don't be frightened of anybody, don't be

intimidated. You might get shout that occasionally by a politician

but they are never going to hit you. Unless it's John Prescott, of

course. Gordon Brown, terribly grumpy in his public image. He is a

hoot in private. He loves football, tell jokes, has a drink. You would

never see that, the public. You never saw it on TV, on radio. I

love it pulling the Leader David Cameron because he's incredibly

thin skinned. He wasn't born with a silver spoon in his mouth, but an

entire dinner said. He wants to be taken seriously. -- dinner set. He

got a job with the Tory party as a researcher. Somebody ran at a

Buckingham Palace and put in a word. I like pulling his leg and

reminding him of that. We don't have to balance grape. The papers

themselves were making the news lately. All three Westminster

parties there they will vote for News Corporation to abandon its

takeover of BSkyB. The News Corporation boss bows to relentless

pressure after prices -- crisis talks with his top executives.

it something anybody knew about really? I love newspapers and I

thought I knew everything that went on but the extent of the telephone

hacking revelations are completely surprising to me. I'm totally blind

side by it. If you had to will be the News of the World were close, I

would believe it. Then again, I wouldn't believe a newspaper would

hack into the voice messages of Milly Dowler, a girl who had been

abducted and then delete some of them when her voice mail was full

up. That wasn't journalism but in humanity. Fleet Street is dog-eat-

dog but no one wants to see a newspaper closing. You like to see

your rivals taken down a peg or two but to do more on the passing of a

paper. Something like the News of the World, OK, it was a fierce

commercial rival but had 168 years of history. In 1843, when it was

founded, it carried one of the first reviews of a Christmas Carol

by Charles Dickens. All the sudden, it was a bad place but were

sacrificed by a management who really should have gone and the

If you cannot beat them, you can join them! There will always be a

future for newspapers, even with all the modern developments. People

like to read it in trains, even in the bath if you want to. As long as

we can get enough people to buy them, it will be OK.

Easy as that! Well, here's someone else in the news, but not making

the headlines many people thought she would. Helen Milligan, who

lives in Northumberland and who's the Personal Assistant to the boss

of North East bakers, Greggs. She'd been tipped to become Lord Alan

Sugar's new business partner, after reaching last night's final of "The

Apprentice." Things didn't go quite according to plan. But there is a

This is not a job. I am looking for someone who has got a brain and

will start a business with me. For a few heart-stopping minutes

Helen Milligan was just two words away from Lord Sugar's �250,000

investment. But in the end those words went to the man sitting next

to her. Tom, you are hired. Helen failed at the very last, and most

crucial, hurdle: the business plan. I feel terribly disappointed, to be

honest, to be frank with you. Where was your head? Are I understand

what you were saying... Her idea for a national concierge service

didn't impress Lord Sugar or his team of business experts.

obviously disappointed, emotional watching it back. My Achilles heel

was always going to be that I had never started my business. Helen's

been described as a workaholic with little or no social life. She was

so focussed on her tasks, she even forgot the date of her own 30th

birthday while filming the series. Today her employer Greggs praised

her outstanding performance in reaching the final and eased the

pain of her disappointment with a little business incentive of their

own. The great news is that Helen will do a very senior role within

the business. She is away at the moment because the media are very

interested in her, but the -- she will be back within a week. She has

always wanted to do this type of role and it will be good for her

and ours. It seems Helen will have her cake, pie or pasty and eat it!

From the bakers to the confectioners, and the city of York,

which has been at the centre of chocolate production for more than

a century. Henry Rowntree founded his first factory there, back in

1862. Well, the company was taken over by Nestle UK in the 1980s, but

it's still proud of its past. And now a state-of-the-art archive has

been set up at Nestle HQ in York. Amanda Harper reports.

1932, when the factory girls were in it for two as they packed top up

boxes here. It is this rich history captured on film that the company

are keen to cherish in their new archive. It is great to have this

it did -- all together in one place. We can use it for research as well

as going into the community to show people what we have here.

state-of-the-art facility is packed with history from old catalogues

and packaging to these quirky characters. Just take a look at

this huge Ed Balls that dates back to the roaring 1920s when life was

lived to excess and no expense Big and bold romantic gestures made

here in York would laugh, but the company actually travelled far and

wide. This is the 10 of cocoa that was with Scott of the Antarctic

when he died. We -- a rescue party went to find him seven months after

he died and they found Visteon and we have kept it in the archive ever

since. The archive gives us a taste of our chocolate loving society.

These products of the past can be enjoyed for many years to come.

Easter egg chocolate always tastes are different, doesn't it? I do not

know why it! Time for sport now, and Newcastle

off to the USA for a pre season tour without another player.

Yes, Joey Barton and Nile Ranger already stopped from going because

of their criminal convictions, and now it seems new signing Yohan

Cabaye is the third player to be denied a visa. Apparently it's due

to some minor technicality, but it means he'll also be going to the

Netherlands on the reserve tour. Sunderland have made another

signing today but it's not another player. The club has signed a

partnership agreement with top Ghanian side Asante Kotoko as they

aim to promote the club in Africa. The Black Cats want to capitalise

on having Ghanian striker Asamoah Gyan in their ranks and will give

the African side support and advice on coaching, fitness and player

development. Meanwhile Middlesbrough have made

their first signing of the summer. France U21 midfielder Malaury

Martin has agreed a one-year contract after impressing Tony

Mowbray during a short trial. He's captained his country at youth

level and made his debut in Boro's win in Croatia yesterday.

Now, more than a few eyebrows were raised when Hartlepool United

announced adult season tickets for just �100, assuming 4,000 fans

signed up for the special offer. Well, by Friday's deadline nearly

6,000 supporters had pledged to trump up the cash, surprising even

A dangerous gamble or a genius marketing ploy? One thing is

certain. They'll be seeing much bigger crowds at Victoria Park this

season thanks to an offer many have found too good to turn down as it's

three times cheaper than an early bird season ticket 12 months ago.

Nearly 5,700 beat Friday's �100 deadline for a club with a stadium

capacity of just shy of 8,000. Season tickets at the slightly

higher price of �150 are now available until the end of the

month after which they'll more than double. We have dropped the crowds

by 2,500 so we wanted to do something to inspire people to come

back to Victoria Park and support the team, get people behind the

team and hopefully that would spur them on to get better results. The

people in been ground will have extra money in their pockets to buy

programmes and food. Also from a commercial point of view, Our

Sponsors and advertisers are more likely to do business with us up

with 6,000 in the ground than 2,500. The marketing wing has certainly

helped, but with dozens of football clubs struggling with dwindling

crowds, have the team found a long- term solution? I have said that

this is what you have to do to get the fans back to the turnstiles,

take a bit of a risk and coming up with a deal that can try to give

something back to people. It is typical in this financial climate

because people do not have the money that they had to spend on

football before. Clubs up and down the country would be daft not to do

something like this next year. Thousands of hardy souls braved the

unseasonal weather to take part in the third annual Great North 10k

yesterday. More than 5,000 competitors, from elite racers to

fun runners, took part along a new course through the streets of

Gateshead and along the Quayside before crossing the finishing line

at the International Stadium. British International Scott Overall

was the men's winner while Louise Damen took the honours for the

women. But it was a day where everyone who battled through the

soggy conditions deserved a medal. 10 kilometres, it leads up to it

several weeks before the major run. It is a nice race. I would

recommend this before the main event. The last time I did 10 K was

a while ago. The last hill was tough, but apart from that it was

great. It was a wonderful course, absolutely Fabulous.

Durham's pro40 match against Surrey yesterday was a complete washout.

These were the scenes at Chester le Street as the rain spoiled the day

once again. But the dreadful conditions didn't stop the golfers

at the British Open at Sandwich. This birdie on the 7th to take him

three over par was as good as it got for Ashington's Ken Ferrie

though who went on to finish second last with 21 over. But York's Simon

Dyson put in a great performance in atrocious conditions to end up two

over par for the tournament to take a share of ninth place and make him

the top ranked Englishman in the What a terrible weekend in terms of

weather. There is more rain on the way as

well, you're going to tell us? Yes. The week ahead does not bode

too well for the next couple of days. Most of us will see more

showers and they will be a heavy again. There'll be some brightness,

and later in the week things will dry up. Heavy showers around that

the minute. We gradually see them becoming less widespread as we head

through the night. Most places will be dry by morning, just the odd

shower hanging on across the North Yorkshire coast, a couple in parts

of Cumbria, but mostly dry by the morning. Temperatures no lower than

11 or 12. Very light winds overnight as well. Tomorrow, we

have got a Met Office warning for those heavy showers. We could see

between 10 mm and 20 mm of rain in some places in the space of an hour.

That is a lot of rain and that is likely to cause localised flooding.

Mostly a dry start to the day, a bit of brightness, but the clouds

will bubble up and that will produce some showers in the morning.

By the afternoon, those showers will be slow maul -- slow-moving

across parts of the north-east. Cumbria escaped the worst of the

showers, but it is this cloudy and generally try it weather. The

temperatures should peak around 20 degrees. With those very well light

winds, catch a heavy shower and it is going nowhere fast. Heavy

downpours in the latter part of tomorrow afternoon, especially in

the eastern areas. It is not just sunny spells and scattered showers,

the showers are up there because of the low pressure. The weather

fronts are draped around it. Next week, the -- the middle part of the

week, there will be more rain as well. The showers will be less of a

problem towards the end of the wake -- week. Tomorrow, plenty of

showers in the east. By Wednesday, the brain becomes more widespread,

but temperatures making it into the high teens. For Thursday, the odd

shower around still. The West will see the worst. By Friday, the

showers are few and far between. A couple in the east, but by that

time the temperatures will be struggling. Whatever the weather is

doing, you can send us your to light weather pictures to the usual

address. Now for a look at tonight's

headlines. John Yates, the assistant commissioner of the

Metropolitan Police, has resigned as the phone hacking scandal claims

another top officer. His boss, Sir Paul Stephenson, stepped down

yesterday. And people living in a Cumbrian

village have begun clearing up after a heavy downpour turned a

normally small beck into a torrent. Homes were flooded and a bridge

collapsed. And that's almost it. Join us for

tomorrow's Look North, an exclusive preview of Batman Live which opens

in Manchester tonight, and comes to Newcastle next week. It's a visual

treat. This is one of my favourite moments. We are creating the