Pym to be chair of Northern Rock bad bank

Richard Pym has been appointed as chairman of Northern Rock's "bad bank". He was chief executive of Alliance & Leicester between 2002 and 2007 and is chairman of Bradford & Bingley, another nationalised bank.

Northern Rock Asset Management, the name under which the bad bank will trade after it is split from "good" Northern Rock plc, will hold most of the bank's mortgages and will stay in public hands post split.

On the board of the bank, Mr Pym will be joined by Sue Langley, an executive at Lloyds of London, and Keith Morgan, representing the Government.

The other non-executives, Kent Atkinson, Bob Davies and Philip Remnant, come from the existing Northern Rock. Andy Tate, director of debt management at Northern Rock, will join the board as chief operating officer. The chief executive of both banks after the split will be Gary Hoffman, the former Barclaycard boss who currently runs Northern Rock.

Northern Rock Plc, the "good bank" which is set to be sold and contains the bank's state-backed deposit business and a small number of less risky home loans, will be chaired by Ron Sandler. He is chairman of the existing Northern Rock and earns £350,000, but will see that cut to £250,000 when he takes charge of the good bank.

Also on the board will be Mike Fairey, a former Lloyds TSB senior executive, Mark Pain, a finance director of Abbey National, and Mary Phibbs, a senior credit chief at Standard Chartered. Laurie Adams and Richard Coates, non-executives of the current Northern Rock, will join them. Rick Hunkin, chief risk officer of the existing company, will retain that title and be appointed to the board as an executive director.