Sir Fred 'won't give up pension'

[Craig 6702]

Ex-Royal Bank of Scotland boss Sir Fred Goodwin has rejected calls to give up his £650,000-a-year pension.

 

Chancellor Alistair Darling had asked him to hand back his £16m pension pot amid anger about rewards for failure.

 

But Sir Fred rejected that request in a letter to the Treasury in which he also says ministers agreed to the deal.

 

Mr Darling says that the government had thought the deal was legally binding when it was agreed in October, but now realised they could have blocked it.

 

He asked Sir Fred, who helped drive the bank to the brink of ruin, to hand back some of the pension money.

 

But in a letter to Treasury minister Lord Myners, Sir Fred rejects the chancellor's plea, saying: "I hope that you understand my rationale for declining your request to voluntarily reduce my pension entitlement".

 

Sir Fred says he agreed to a series of "gestures" in October, when he was negotiating his departure from the bank, such as foregoing the equivalent of 15 months salary.

 

But when it came to the issue of his pension "you indicated that you were aware of my entitlement and that no further 'gestures' would be required", writes Sir Fred.

 

At the time he stood down Mr Darling had hailed the fact Sir Fred had waived his contractual entitlement and decided "to do the right thing".

 

There was no mention of the size of pension he was going to receive.

 

Mr Darling, who had asked Lord Myners to speak to Sir Fred about giving up his pension, said that the government had been under the impression in October that the pension deal was legally binding.

 

But in the past week it had realised that that was not the case.

 

"It was only very recently that we became aware that the decision of the previous board of RBS to allow Sir Fred to take early retirement had the effect of increasing his pension entitlement and that might have been a discretionary choice," Mr Darling told MPs.

 

He said the government was investigating the possibility of "clawing back" some of the money through legal action.

 

But critics, including deputy chairman of the Treasury committee, Tory MP Michael Fallon, say the chances of recovering the money through the courts were slim.

 

Mr Fallon said the episode demonstrated the government's "sheer incompetence".

 

"I think it will be very hard to put this right unless Sir Fred does the decent thing," he told BBC News.

 

Source: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/7912651.stm

 

I hope the greedy cunt gets mugged. Fucking disgrace that he's drawing over half a million a year in pension when he was single-handedly responsible for the mess that RBS find themselves in.

 

Someone at the Government needs to take a long hard look too. How the fuck could they have missed that fact that a figure such as £650k p.a. was not a legally binding agreement?

 

Totally fucking incompetent - I have no confidence in them, nor the other lot.

[Craig 6702]

No... he's a thieving cunt!

[Fop 1]

No... he's a thieving cunt!

 

They all are.

[Matt 0]

I'm sure the 20,000 employees who are about to lose their job would have a few choice words for him.

[ChezGiven 0]

Lord Miners (or whatever he's called) reviewed this and as an expert in these matters should have seen the discretionary clause.

 

Either incompetence or complicity.

[Fop 1]

I'm sure the 20,000 employees who are about to lose their job would have a few choice words for him.

 

Pretty sure he couldn't give a monkeys though.

 

 

The big problem really is that absolutely nothing is being done to change the reward for failure/no risk for failure system. There's a lot of hot air about it currently, but when the everything eventually does clear the management practices will be no different to the were pre-credit crunch (although other things might be regulated a bit more).

[Rob W 0]

would anyone here give up that sort of money? I wouldn't

[NJS 4447]

"single-handedly responsible" is nonsense. There are a plethora of traders, risk managers and senior managers who've contributed.

 

Having said that I hope he gets nowt - they should convert it to RBS shares - that would teach him.

[Guest alex]

I blame the people who agreed to this rather than him.

[Fop 1]

would anyone here give up that sort of money? I wouldn't

 

You have no principles though.

[Fop 1]

Vince is bang on as usual though:

 

 

Mr Cable said Sir Fred should receive £27,000 a year - the amount he would have received under the pension protection scheme if RBS had gone bankrupt, which would have happened if it had not been bailed-out by taxpayers.

[Matt 0]

Vince Cable is a popularist no-mark, the political equivalent of Jeremy Vine's phone-in.

[Fop 1]

Vince Cable is a popularist no-mark, the political equivalent of Jeremy Vine's phone-in.

 

Maybe, or maybe not, but that doesn't make him wrong.

 

Sir?

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/scotland/glasgo...est/7916521.stm

[Meenzer 15871]

Vince is often right, just several years too late. I suppose it's better than most politicians can hope for.

[Rob W 0]

would anyone here give up that sort of money? I wouldn't

 

You have no principles though.

 

 

not true, not true

 

they are available for sale 24/7

[manc-mag 1]

would anyone here give up that sort of money? I wouldn't

 

You have no principles though.

 

 

not true, not true

 

they are available for sale 24/7

 

[Park Life 71]

You see this is why guns should be legalised and widely distributed.

[GeordieMessiah 2]

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/scotland/7917705.stm

 

RBS pays for Sir Fred's security

 

Royal Bank of Scotland is still paying personal security costs for its former chief executive, Sir Fred Goodwin.

 

The bank is providing CCTV monitoring of his Edinburgh home and security staff to keep photographers at bay.

 

Sir Fred, 50, is facing intense political and public pressure over his £693,000 pension, despite leaving the bank with massive losses.

 

An RBS spokesman said it was standard to provide security for executives and cover would be withdrawn within weeks.

 

Sir Fred's pension fund doubled to £16m last October when he agreed to take early retirement.

 

'Not appropriate'

 

The Treasury, which pumped £20bn into the struggling bank, was anxious to get new management in place.

 

The UK Government is now trying to claw back the money, saying it was misled into thinking the pension was legally binding.

 

Commenting on the security arrangements, Shadow Chancellor George Osborne told BBC Scotland's Politics Show: "I don't think it is appropriate, and I think most people will find it surprising.

 

"It's good news that the current management is going to withdraw that support. It's not appropriate the taxpayer should be providing any more benefits to Sir Fred Goodwin."

 

The government pumped billions into RBS in October to keep it afloat, and currently owns a stake of more than 70% in the bank, which announced the largest annual loss in UK corporate history, totalling £24.1bn in 2008.

 

Meanwhile, Deputy Labour Leader Harriet Harman has told the BBC Sir Fred should not "count on" keeping his full pension.

 

She described the settlement - agreed by the RBS board - as "money for nothing".

 

So, not content with running off with a rip-off pension he's now being protected at expense of the RBS...which ultimately means at our expense.

 

Just gets better and better this, doesn't it.

[Matt 0]

All this uproar over his pension has superbly distracted from the admissions of failure from the FSA- which Gordy B put in place to regulate the banking system. The longer the government spin this story, the less they'll get the blame.

[Fop 1]

All this uproar over his pension has superbly distracted from the admissions of failure from the FSA- which Gordy B put in place to regulate the banking system. The longer the government spin this story, the less they'll get the blame.

 

That's what the whole thing is about, Brown and Co. trying to deflect outrage and pretend they are doing something about it.

 

 

He still should never have got the "optional extras" on his pension pot though, in fact as said he should really have got the amount he would had they gone bust, as effective they did go bust, only unlike NR/B&B the Government decided to save them in a different way.