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From out of nowhere this bank has swept into the UK and managed to attract one in every four mortgages being arranged in the first half of 2008.

Rather than cower in a corner at the fearsome sight of a UK economy constricted by the credit crunch, this bold bank kept its cool and is now able to boast a mortgage book consisting of lower risk borrowers and report a 25.6 per cent chunk of the nation's total mortgage lending.

This increase in UK mortgage market share for Santander, Abbey had a 9.43 per cent market share at the end of 2006, is even before it gets its hands on Alliance & Leicester, the latest lender to be caught in this juggernaut's headlights. You have to admire its gusto.

It is a shame the same could not be said for those currently controlling our nation's economy. If there was a prize for procrastination it would have to go to the government that took almost a decade to bring in home information packs and has spent a year debating what it can do to kick start the mortgage market.

Believe it or not the credit crunch is far from a sprightly upstart just beginning to bite at the heels of the nation's lenders, mortgage advisers and consumers. It is almost a year since the wholesale money markets screamed in horror at what was happening in the US.

The credit crunch has fully gripped our economy, it was even mentioned on the nation's most established soap opera Coronation Street last week.

What has the government done to re-open the market? We have had the Bank of England's special liquidity scheme that looked and felt like trying to put a sticking plaster on a broken leg. It has not really hit on the root of the problem.

The appointment of a mortgage market heavyweight likes Sir James Crosby, former chief executive of the nation's previous biggest mortgage lender HBoS, seemed like a wise move. But what conclusions has Sir James come up with? Sir James, deputy chairman of the FSA, has only been able to produce suggestions.

If you turn to page 8 and read David Pawsey's news story on Sir James' 46-page interim report, it should be clear the former HBoS boss has many plans that would be great to see put into action. But it is not Sir James who controls the coffers or who can tell the authorities what they must do.

Abbey's success story shows it can pay to take decisive action in this market while others dither. The lines of savers outside Northern Rock and the eventual nationalisation of the Newcastle-based lender shows how if you let something drag on for too long a drama will turn into a crisis.

Emma Ann Hughes is editor of Mortgage Adviser