THIS week ten years ago, a video featuring older people from Darlington became an internet phenomenon.

The video of pensioners dancing with trolleys was posted on YouTube and attracted thousands of viewers.

More than 53,000 people watched the video,and it was featured on the website of a national newspaper.

Growing Older Living in Darlington (Gold) development worker Lesley Compson said: "The older people are delighted – it's given them their 15 minutes of fame.”

Meanwhile, the works of one of the region's most famous artist were auctioned.

Seven paintings by Norman Cornish were expected to fetch up to £20,000 when they went on sale at Newcastle auctioneers, Anderson and Garland.

Mr Cornish was best known for his portraits of fellow pitmen in his home town of Spennymoor, County Durham.

Auctioneer John Anderson said: "Norman's work has seen an enormous increase in value since the 90s and this will clearly continue as his reputation as our greatest living local artist grows.”

A redundant North-East shipyard was predicted to bring more than 3,000 jobs to the region.

The £250m deal immediately created 800 skilled jobs, creating drilling rigs at the Haverton Hill yard, near Billingham, Teesside.

The contract for the work was worth up to £251m and awarded to the Teesside Alliance Group (TAG), which included Darlington based Cleveland Bridge.

TAG chairman David Eason predicted that for every new job at the yard, as many as four others could be created, and with 800 new positions, the "ripple effect" could lead to another 3,200 jobs being created.

Also that week, the government announced changes to the law that would strip pubs or clubs of their licences if they failed to stamp out trouble.

The maximum fine for on street drinking was also increased from £500 to £2,500.

John Tierney, a Durham University criminology lecturer who spent years researching the link between crime and alcohol, said: “It would be a sobering experience to visit an A&E department on a Friday night or Saturday morning.

“You would see a huge increase in people coming in with injuries caused by an accident which happened because they were drunk or because they have been the victim of an assault.”