Beorn
03-09-2010, 11:06 PM
The Bank of England has announced that £20 notes with the image of the beloved English composer will not be legal tender after June 30 this year.
Sir Edward, whose melodies have come to capture a certain type of Englishness, is to be pulped a mere 11 years after he had the honour of gracing the £20 note. William Shakespeare managed 23 years in our wallets before he was discontinued from the £20 note.
After June 30 shops will no longer have to accept the notes, and it is up to individual banks whether they agree to swap notes after this date.
From July 1 only notes with the image of Adam Smith, the Scottish economist, will be legal tender. These notes first came into circulation in March 2007.
Dr John Harcup, chairman of the West Midlands branch of the Elgar Society, the branch which incorporates Elgar's birthplace in Worcester, said: "I'm very sad. We were very upset when the Bank of England first announced Adam Smith was going to replace him back in 2007. The timing was awful as it coincided with the 150th anniversary of his birth.
"I will have to hang on to my last two Elgars. We're all feeling he's been very hard done by," he said, adding that many Elgar afficionados are smarting from the composer's exclusion from Classic FM's list of 50 best composers that it unveiled last month.
About 10 per cent of all £20 notes in circulation – equating to 150 million notes, worth £3 billion – are the old versions featuring the composer. They were introduced in June 1999 along with a view of the west face of Worcester Cathedral, replacing the previous series of notes featuring Michael Faraday, the physicist, and before that William Shakespeare.
The Bank of England periodically issues fresh designs using new technologies to cut down on forgeries. The new Adam Smith £20 design included more of the printed words raised and a greater number of flecks that show bright red and green under an ultraviolet light.
Old Elgar £20 notes will eventually be pulped, compressed into bricks and sent to one of the official Government incinerators, where they will burned alongside damaged notes. A small amount of electric power is generated by these sites, which also burn illegal tobacco seized by HM Revenue & Customs at British ports.
After June 30 if a bank or building society refuses to swap a note, consumers have the right to swap the notes at the Bank of England itself. The Bank promises that it will honour the face value of any note issued, even notes from before the Second World War, if consumers turn up to Threadneedle Street in London.
People can send them to the Bank through the post, but a spokesman pointed out that this was entirely at the sender's risk. Last year as many as 3,526 consumers visited the teller's counter at the Bank itself to swap old notes for their up-to-date versions.
Source (http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/personalfinance/consumertips/banking/7398164/Elgar-20-note-no-longer-legal-tender.html)
When will England be free of that imperialist Scottish machine?
Anyway, this all reminds me of the tiny stand-up I had with the introduction of Scottish faces onto English money. I took the idea off an English blogger to make my voice heard by plastering the sentence 'Celt Gelt' on every Scottish/English? £20 note.
I still have yet to come across one. Perhaps they pulp them too?
(http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/personalfinance/consumertips/banking/7398164/Elgar-20-note-no-longer-legal-tender.html)
Sir Edward, whose melodies have come to capture a certain type of Englishness, is to be pulped a mere 11 years after he had the honour of gracing the £20 note. William Shakespeare managed 23 years in our wallets before he was discontinued from the £20 note.
After June 30 shops will no longer have to accept the notes, and it is up to individual banks whether they agree to swap notes after this date.
From July 1 only notes with the image of Adam Smith, the Scottish economist, will be legal tender. These notes first came into circulation in March 2007.
Dr John Harcup, chairman of the West Midlands branch of the Elgar Society, the branch which incorporates Elgar's birthplace in Worcester, said: "I'm very sad. We were very upset when the Bank of England first announced Adam Smith was going to replace him back in 2007. The timing was awful as it coincided with the 150th anniversary of his birth.
"I will have to hang on to my last two Elgars. We're all feeling he's been very hard done by," he said, adding that many Elgar afficionados are smarting from the composer's exclusion from Classic FM's list of 50 best composers that it unveiled last month.
About 10 per cent of all £20 notes in circulation – equating to 150 million notes, worth £3 billion – are the old versions featuring the composer. They were introduced in June 1999 along with a view of the west face of Worcester Cathedral, replacing the previous series of notes featuring Michael Faraday, the physicist, and before that William Shakespeare.
The Bank of England periodically issues fresh designs using new technologies to cut down on forgeries. The new Adam Smith £20 design included more of the printed words raised and a greater number of flecks that show bright red and green under an ultraviolet light.
Old Elgar £20 notes will eventually be pulped, compressed into bricks and sent to one of the official Government incinerators, where they will burned alongside damaged notes. A small amount of electric power is generated by these sites, which also burn illegal tobacco seized by HM Revenue & Customs at British ports.
After June 30 if a bank or building society refuses to swap a note, consumers have the right to swap the notes at the Bank of England itself. The Bank promises that it will honour the face value of any note issued, even notes from before the Second World War, if consumers turn up to Threadneedle Street in London.
People can send them to the Bank through the post, but a spokesman pointed out that this was entirely at the sender's risk. Last year as many as 3,526 consumers visited the teller's counter at the Bank itself to swap old notes for their up-to-date versions.
Source (http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/personalfinance/consumertips/banking/7398164/Elgar-20-note-no-longer-legal-tender.html)
When will England be free of that imperialist Scottish machine?
Anyway, this all reminds me of the tiny stand-up I had with the introduction of Scottish faces onto English money. I took the idea off an English blogger to make my voice heard by plastering the sentence 'Celt Gelt' on every Scottish/English? £20 note.
I still have yet to come across one. Perhaps they pulp them too?
(http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/personalfinance/consumertips/banking/7398164/Elgar-20-note-no-longer-legal-tender.html)