UK government (or other) guarantee for savings

I've been trying to find a clear statement on safety limits of UK savings but cannot find anything definitive. If I state what seems to be the case perhaps someone can correct if necessary or point to a definitive web site...? From reports such as

and others it seems that:

1. Total savings in a UK shore-based bank are government-guaranteed up to £35,000.
2. Ditto for a building society
3. Above £35,000 with any one institution is not (yet) guaranteed in any way
4. This limit applies to the total savings so if we have ISA and deposit account with £30,000 in each there would still only be £35,000 guaranteed.
5. Savings with Northern Rock (being taxpayer-owned) are 100% guaranteed regardless of how much is saved with them - ISAs, savings accounts and current accounts.

Is that close?

and others it seems that:

1. Total savings in a UK shore-based bank are government-guaranteed up to 35,000.
2. Ditto for a building society
3. Above 35,000 with any one institution is not (yet) guaranteed in any way
4. This limit applies to the total savings so if we have ISA and deposit account with 30,000 in each there would still only be 35,000 guaranteed.
5. Savings with Northern Rock (being taxpayer-owned) are 100% guaranteed regardless of how much is saved with them - ISAs, savings accounts and current accounts.

Is that close?

You said "we". So if there are two of you, you have £70k covered. The limit is per institution and per depositor.

Didn't take me long to find this the other day:

Incidentally, what matters is whether the deposit taker is separately registered, rather than whether it is an independent company. If you delve into the above site you will find this point explained.

It also helps to be aware of the limits of 'safety' on what is essentially an untried scheme in terms of major meltdown. Compensation under FSCS is funded by a levy on the remaining financial institutions, so e.g the bigger the crashing player, the less the money to call on. FSCS can apparently raise up to £1.8bn per annum from other savings instititions, If this is not enough it can levy all related financial instititution members which will bring the total up to approx £4.3bn per annum.

To put that in context total retail (savings) deposits with Northern Rock were £20+bn and commercial loans were £70+bn. So there are questions regarding how transparent the levels of losses are, and whether the bank closes before the level of losses become too large.

I believe there may also be issues of commercial loans sometimes being preference loans and having greater call on a banks assets, leaving a larger amount of customer losses to be funded by the compensation scheme.

Toom