Speaking on GMR Chris Hamilton said, "I'm not one to blow my own trumpet, but I've worked hard. It's been traumatic the last few days - I've ben biting my nails."

"We've been in constant dialogue with the 'revenue' over what's acceptable - doing our budgets to provide proposals that were acceptable to all parties - including commitments that we can meet."

Hamilton admitted that a proposal based on life in NL2 has been submitted alongside the NL1 budgets earlier in the week, but was worried by the IR's statement that they would continue with their action on Wednesday.

"The difficulty is that they (the 'revenue') don't give you much encouragement," said Hamilton.

After a late meeting last night to amend the proposals, the revised figures were submitted this morning. "I called them earlier today," said Hamilton," but our contact had passed the document on to her manager. When the callk came through, I said a little prayer before answering the phone: fortunately for us, the answer was in the affirmative and they are prepared to give us one last chance to pay off the debt. It's a massive, massive relief."

But Hamilton is cautious about celebrating, appreciating that the work starts here: "Having been granted the opportunity to repay it (the debt), we've now got a lot of work to do - it's the start of a new era for RL in Oldham."

He went on: "Lots of time and effort have to be put in learning from what's gone wrong and avoid lurching from one crisis to another. We have to try and harness people's love of RL in Oldham and take it forward with new vigour."