Former Deputy Leader of the Labour Party, John Prescott, has launched a campaign to stop RBS paying £1 billion in bonuses to staff, despite posting record losses and utilising £20 billion of tax payers money to stave off collapse. The ‘No Ifs, No Buts’ campaign started as a pressure group to ensure the banks were passing on cuts in the interest rates, but has become a vehicle for the public outraged expressed in the UK against the payments of performance bonuses by RBS which had all but collapsed on the Markets early on in the credit crunch.
RBS had to access £20 billion of Central Government funding to prevent a shortfall in its liquid funds towards the end of 2008 and would have collapsed entirely without this aid. In return the UK Government became the majority shareholder in the company, effectively taking full ownership. The logic behind the campaign is simple, as the UK public fund the Government through its taxes, and the elected Government decided to ‘buy’ RBS, it makes every UK Tax payer an owner of RBS. Therefore if it is the will of the people to deny these bonuses on the grounds that, quite simply, the Bankers do not deserve to be rewarded for their failure, the Government should intervene and stop the payments.
There are a number of other issues brought up by this debate which are all very important to the development of responsible capitalism and it is also a great example of how the will of the people can become a powerful weapon against outright corporate greed, which serves no one but a handful of institutional investors and select number of money men.
The Campaign is important and is a featured link in our Capaigns section, or you can access it in the links section the right of the screen. Support this and see people power in action over the next few days. If you have Facebook, please join the group here.
February 13, 2009 at 8:38 am
[...] British Bankers Face Grilling Posted on February 13, 2009 by timskyrme The heads of Britain’s beleaguered Banking system are facing a Government Inquiry into the collapse of their Balance Sheets during the credit crunch. During the first day of the enquiry the heads of the biggest banking institutions apologised to the public for their part in bringing about the crisis which has engulfed the global economy. Whilst the hearing was due to address a number of issues with the conduct of the banks, it has been hijacked by news that RBS, amongst other institutions were set to pay an estimated £1 billion in bonuses despite posting a record loss of £28 billion and having to access a government lifeline cash injection which effectively nationalised the bank. John Prescott, former Leader of the Labour Party began campaigning for the banks to drop the bonuses as grossly unfair with his No Ifs, No Buts vehicle. [...]