Owed to a government
The bridge started life with a debt of
nearly £155 million. Interest was at that time a
staggering 13.63 per cent. The debt thus climbed rapidly, doubling in
less than ten years. By 1992 it had risen to £425,307,192.
It was at this point that the government
intervened. Without this, the debt would have spiralled to £650
million by March 1997.
A new loan agreement signed in 1997 reduced the
interest charged on the loan to 7.75 per cent. The agreement also wrote
off £66 million of debt and suspended interest payments on
£240 million of the outstanding £359 million. The aim was
to pay off all remaining debt in 40 years. By 2004/5 the total debt
stood at £337 million.
For full details of the history of the debt, see
the Hansard record of a Parliamentary written answer to Shona
McIsaac, Labour MP for Cleethorpes.
