WORK has begun on insurance firm Hiscox’s new £19 million Hungate office.

This is excellent news – and not just because the company plans to create hundreds of new jobs in York. The fact that work has started on the company’s new offices has a significance beyond that.

For years, the development of Hungate was stalled because of the recession.

This summer after agreement was reached over affordable housing and payment towards community facilities, work began on 195 new homes.

With work now also under way on Hiscox’s offices, this long-neglected quarter of York will soon be a thriving business and residential centre. It’s like a physical statement, in bricks and mortar, that the recession is, at long last, well and truly over.