22/04/2014 Look North (North East and Cumbria)

Good evening. club turned out to be a stalemate.

Good evening. The Northern Rock Foundation, which

has handed out more than ?2 million to hundreds of charities, is to

close. It says it can't strhke a deal with Virgin Money, which bought

Northern Rock, for future long`term funding.

From premature babies in Newcastle to a theatre group in Blyth, over

the last 16 years the Northdrn Rock Foundation has helped them `ll. Over

1000 charities benefited from grants. But today the news that it

is being wound up. Although Virgin Money's Sir Richard Branson gave the

Foundation his backing when he took over Northern Rock, negotiations

over future funding between the bank and foundation have broken down It

is the end of the road. It was an absolute jewel of the

North East. It is difficult to explain just how wonderful ht was.

No other company I can think of in corporate history has devotdd such a

high proportion of its profhts to this particular activity. It was

doing wonderful things, so ht is a sad day.

The Northern Rock Foundation was originally set up in 1997. The Rock

collapsed in 2008 with the financial crisis. While a buyer was found an

interim arrangement kept thd fundation going for the next two

years. Virgin Money took ovdr the Rock in January 2012 and signed a

deal to fund the foundation until December last year. After months of

negotiations though, today ht announced it's closing.

For people like Stuart, who runs a mental health charity in thd North

East and has just had a grant from the foundation, it is a sad day

I know many charities nowad`ys spend their reserves, just to survive

Unfortunately I think we will see many charities closing. There just

isn't the money to sustain them any more. Northern Rock going is another

blow to the charity sector. Virgin Money wants to continue to

fund the foundation, just not to the same extent.

We have made more than one proposal about joint projects and thdy

involve significant funding. One of those was equal to the amount we

have committed in 2014, ?1 lillion, so not insignificant. What we were

not able to do was commit to the levels of funding that the

foundation said they would require to continue their grant`givhng

programme. With local councils also cutting

financial support, today's news could leave some charities `cross

the region with new questions about their future.

A campaign to save Durham Tdes Valley Airport is to be takdn to ten

Downing Street. A 4,500`signature petition will be handed in later

this week, with campaigners calling for investment and a greater effort

to attract flights and passdngers. It looks like an airport, it just

rarely feels like one. Dailx flights to Aberdeen and Amsterdam offer some

activity. But the recession and the decision by low`cost airlinds to

move elsewhere have clearly been damaging. This couple believe not

enough of a fight has been put up to save the airport and attract

carriers back here. I think it is absolutely

devastating. It is like havhng an empty shop. You go in and there is

nothing to buy, so you are obviously not going to use it. We havd nothing

there. In 2006, just short of one lillion

passengers used the airport. But that tally has been falling steadily

since, so by last year just over 160,000 people used Durham Tees

Valley. So the airport's owners have drawn up a master plan. Thex want to

build hundreds of homes herd and business parks for the aviation

industry. Many airports are having to look at

widening the base of their `ctivity. Very few are surviving on aviation

and flying income alone. Thdy are all looking at the potentials within

their estates. Many other ahrports are similarly looking at property

development that brings valte to the airport.

The low`level nuclear waste store at Drigg in West Cumbria will continue

to operate, despite fears that the site will eventually be eroded by

rising sea levels. The oper`tors say that even in the worst case scenario

the impact on life and the environment will be insignificant.

The operator of the low`levdl waste repository in Drigg assumes that in

the next few hundred to 1000 years the site will disappear bendath the

advancing waves. It also assumes that no one will do anything about

it. Even so, it says that in this scenario, radiation levels will be

lower than the levels we ard already exposed to buy the environmdnt.

Nuclear waste is a diminishhng hazard. It decays over time and most

of the waste which is stored here will decay over time. So thd waste

any hazard go away. 20 microsieverts is really insignificant.

However, the Environment Agdncy says that the repository would not be

built on the site today. If somebody came to us now `nd said

that we want to put a site here we would say, from our current

understanding this is not the best place for it. If you can make a case

for it, then we will allow ht, but this is not the best place.

However, the Cumbrian environmental pressure group CORE says it is not

surprised that the issue is being played down. In a statement, it says

that this should be a wake`tp call to the nuclear industry's plans for

new build expansions and underground dumps in threatened coastal areas

throughout the UK. Football ` and one result from the

Championship tonight: Reading 2`0 Middlesbrough. No it looks like a

mid`table finish to the season for the Boro. Reading still in the hunt

for a play`off spot. That's all from us. After a

surprisingly lovely Easter weekend, let's get the weather prospdcts

Good evening. The night. A lot of cloud around. We will see some sunny

spells developing as we head into the afternoon. The code will thicken

in the West at the tail end of the day. We may see some misty

conditions along parts of the North East coast. Top temperature is 7

Celsius. The best of the brhght spells will be in the West.

is not looking too bad. That's weather front.

It is never too early to think about next weekend and I will be doing

that in a couple of minutes. But we have a sizeable chunk of this

week's whether to go first. There are more showers, but there will be

spells of warm sunshine around as well,