A slow recovery, says Yorkshire’s COO

In comments to the Yorkshire Post, John Hooper said “there’s certainly some warmth in the air”.

But he added “it’s very hard to work out what that actually means in terms of actual growth and employment”.

He is not expecting “any sort of hockey sticks recovery” and believes the recovery will be “slow and variable”.

Mr Hooper welcomed the recent spate of strong economic data and said “long may that continue”.

“It would be good if we could have a long, sustained recovery rather than a quick spurt followed by another drop,” he added.

Parent company National Australia Bank said higher income and lower charges for bad and doubtful debts in the UK were offset by an increase in expenses in a third quarter trading update.

In the three months to June, NAB revealed improved cash earnings in its UK commercial real estate portfolio.