This Community Report is a summary of corporate social responsibility issues addressed by the Company during 2006 and issues still relevant to our business operations from previous years. It has been produced to enable those parties, be they organisations or individuals with an interest in Northern Rock to better understand how our overall business performance and decision making reflect our consideration of environmental, ethical and social issues. We regard those interested parties as shareholders, customers, investors, the local community in which we operate, our staff and union, the organisations who supply us with goods and services, the contractors who perform work on our behalf and other financial institutions with which we transact business.
For further information regarding the 2006 report please contact the CSR Manager below:
How to Contact Us
Write to:
Beryl Keegan
CSR Manager
Northern Rock plc
Lindisfarne Building
Northern Rock House
NEWCASTLE UPON TYNE
NE3 4PL
E-mail: beryl.keegan@northernrock.co.uk
Provision of documents in other formats
At Northern Rock, we want to make our full range of products and services available to as many stakeholders as possible.
If you need additional support by the provision of this document in other formats we’ll do our best to help, please contact:
Disability Awareness Team
Premises Department
Northern Rock plc
Northern Rock House
Newcastle upon Tyne
NE3 4PL
Telephone: 0191 279 5300
Facsimile: 0191 279 698
Chairman's Statement
Welcome to our Community Report, a “live” document which is updated regularly. A formal year-end summary is also included within our Annual Report and Accounts.
Northern Rock's primary social responsibility remains to prosper and share that prosperity with shareholders and other stakeholders. By offering competitive rates, we benefit customers. By achieving sustainable growth, we can create employment mainly in our regional base, offer excellent working conditions and contribute to the local economies in which we operate.
The significant expansion of our Head Office in Gosforth continues to provide a range of job opportunities, the new proposed office development in Sunderland will create capacity for an additional 2,500 jobs and new branches in key cities in the UK will also create around 100 new jobs.
We believe that Northern Rock will prosper by recruiting from varied sections of the community, by adopting flexible employment practices that suit those who want to balance life and work, by providing good facilities for staff and by minimising harmful impacts on the environment from our activities. There is therefore no conflict between creating shareholder value and being socially responsible. To ensure that we set the highest possible standards of personal and corporate ethics, provide good customer service and give employees a good working environment, we encourage assessments by external agencies and support Diversity and Work-Life Balance Initiatives.
We also remember those not benefiting directly from our prosperity. In 2006, Northern Rock was once again one of the top five most charitable FTSE 100 companies, because of its donation of 5% of pre-tax profits to the Northern Rock Foundation. In 2006 this amounted to a remarkable £31.4 million, allowing the Foundation to continue its empowerment of charities and community causes in the North-East and Cumbria. I am particularly pleased that in addition to our corporate stance, our staff continue to take part in voluntary initiatives, fund-raising, mentoring and secondment programmes, and that the Foundation double match funds raised. In 2006 our staff charity, Tiny Lives, was given in excess of £370,000.
I hope you enjoy reading this report, if you have any comments or suggestions please let us know.
