Sales surge in High Street

Retail sales surged last month as shoppers returned to the High Street in force. Data released by the Office for National Statistics yesterday, showed retail sales volumes jumped 1.5 per cent in February, the strongest monthly rise for more than two years, and registering 5.9 per cent above the same month last year.

The rise, which was way ahead of City forecasts, followed two months of falling sales volumes. It has fuelled fears that the Bank of England may raise interest rates sooner rather than later, to rein in spending.

INVESTMENT PAYS: A £4m investment in machinery at a North-East firm will safeguard the jobs of 80 staff and create 25 new posts. The cash injection by Tyneside Safety Glass at Gateshead's Team Valley Trading Estate has also resulted in it receiving a DTI Regional Selective Assistance grant of £400,000. The money will be spent on a new bending and tempering furnace to make curved toughened glass for tractor cabs.

AGENCY SUCCESS: An agency helping to keep top-class graduates in the region has notched up another success. Graduates For Business (GFB), part of enterprise agency Entrust, has helped retain some of the brightest graduates from North-East universities in the region. Neurologist Gina Gilje from Stavanger, Norway, who won a GFB placement after gaining a degree in physiotherapy from the University of Northumbria, is continuing training with Team Valley firm Ability For You, a physiotherapy clinic specialising in neurological, muscular and skeletal problems.

MOVED GOALPOSTS: Power group British Energy, which takes in Hartlepool Power Station, is to make a number of adjustments because of substantial reductions in UK electricity prices. The write-downs and provisions will be in the region of £430m.