The day after it was officially unveiled, the new £10 note was brought to Parliament by the Bank of England so that Parliamentarians, charities and other organisations could see it and learn more about it.
The new £10 note, like the new £5 note, is made of polymer as opposed to the current paper £10 note – this makes the note more durable (for example it is water resistant) and also a lot more secure. The features of these new notes make it a lot harder for people to forge and make fake bank notes. Another feature is the tactile feature: there are two clusters of raised dots in the top left hand corner which allows the blind and partially sighted to identify what value of note they are holding. Many countries in the world including Canada and the US have all denominations of their notes the same size, and doing that would be a good deal cheaper; however, we prefer to keep our notes different sizes, in part to help those who are blind or partially sighted.
As well as the usual classic portrait of Her Majesty on one side of the note, Jane Austen appears on the new note in recognition of her magnificent contribution to literature.
The new £10 note will be in general circulation in September.
I was very impressed with the new £10 note with its modern and helpful features and I look forward to seeing the new £20 note!