Government plans to split and sell state-owned Northern Rock have met with mixed reaction.

The plan is to create a new savings and mortgage bank, called Northern Rock Plc, which will take deposits and offer savings and home loans.

The second part will become Northern Rock Asset Management, holding existing mortgages and unsecured loans, and closed to new lending.

The Chief Secretary to the Treasury Stephen Timms, speaking on Wednesday after European regulators gave clearance for Northern Rock to be broken up, said it was still the government’s intention to sell both arms of Northern Rock, saying it would maximise taxpayers’ gains.

The bank received billions of pounds in state aid and deposit guarantees.

One camp believes that rather than being sold, the bank should be turned into a mutual owned by its customers, while another camp thinks it’s fine to sell it off as a publicly listed company.

What would be best for taxpayers?

• You know exactly what the population of Iceland is and can also pronounce the name of its prime minister.
• Even the word ‘crisis’ seems to have lost its currency.
• Countries pop up for sale on eBay for 99p and get few offers.
• Posters on BBC messageboards stop discussing the undulating pitch of Robert Peston’s voice and listen to what he’s actually saying.
• The speech bubble on Page 3 of the Sun is given over to discussing the credit crisis.
• Financial market updates displace stories about Jade Goody on the tabloid front pages.
• Bad news stories from government departments are rushed out day after day and not even the Opposition seems to notice.
• Estate agents finally admit house prices have fallen but tell you now is a really great time to buy because the market is stabilising.
• People marketing get-rich-quick property seminars don’t get taken seriously any more.
• The Chancellor, writing in the Financial Times, says that “now, more than ever, we need new ideas”.
• Your primary school-aged children know that credit crunch is not a type of biscuit and that IMF isn’t just a fictional organisation in Mission Impossible.
• You go for a while without noticing one estate agent’s mini and then you see a whole bunch of them on the back of a car transporter.
• A pensioner on the evening tube train from Canary Wharf gives up her seat to a banker because she reckons he might need it.
• The Ivy rings to ask if you’d like a table tonight or any night.
• There are no spare trolleys when you turn up at Aldi to do your weekly shop.

Do you have any better suggestions? All contributions welcome - please send in your selection.

The Bank of England has responded to the credit crunch by cutting interest rates by one quarter of a point to five percent, the third cut in five months.

It acknowledges the risks of stoking inflation but says the availability of credit seems to be worsening.

With the difficulties of finding loans so painfully apparent and the housing market in dire straits, do you think it is being too cautious? Should it have cut more?