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Politics : Welcome to Slider's Dugout -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Jamey who wrote (16748)	4/5/2009 9:45:43 AM
From: maceng2	Respond to of 50337

Great interview, very revealing. All the banksters were at it, and still are. telegraph.co.uk Former RBS boss Sir Fred Goodwin: 'I'm keeping my £703,000 pension' Sir Fred Goodwin, the disgraced former boss of Royal Bank of Scotland, has made it clear that he is not prepared to give back any of his £703,000-a-year pension. By Gordon Rayner, Chief Reporter, and Philip Aldrick Last Updated: 8:59AM BST 04 Apr 2009 Royal Bank Of Scotland Group Sir Philip Hampton, the Bank's new chairman, said before the bank's annual general meeting on Friday that Sir Fred was considering a "voluntary reduction" in his hugely controversial pension. But sources close to the former RBS chief executive insisted that although Sir Fred had discussed the matter with Sir Philip 10 days ago, they had failed to reach an agreement and Sir Fred now regarded the matter as closed. Sources close to Sir Fred – nicknamed "Fred the Shred" because of his ruthless cost-cutting – said "various elements" of the pension package were discussed with Sir Philip, including Sir Fred taking his pension from the age of 60 instead of 50 or giving back his lump sum. He rejected putting off his pension until the age of 60 but said he may have been willing to give ground on the lump sum. But RBS paid the tax on the lump sum, and because HM Revenue and Customs said it was not prepared to return the tax paid, Sir Fred was asked if he would consider a reduction in his pension to reflect the fact that the tax could not be recovered. Sir Fred said he was not prepared to do that, and, having had no further talks with Sir Philip, regarded the matter as closed, the source said. When the Telegraph contacted Sir Fred on Friday to ask him if he was considering giving back some of his £17m pension, he said: "I wouldn't have any comment to make at all on that." RBS is now 70 per cent owned by the taxpayer. The body which oversees the public shareholding, UK Financial Investments, registered a protest over Sir Fred's pension by voting against the remuneration report at the AGM, though the move was only symbolic because the vote is not legally binding. Individual shareholders, who have seen the value of their holdings almost wiped out because Sir Fred steered the bank to the brink of collapse, reacted angrily to news that he is standing firm on his pension. Cornelius Cagney, who attended the AGM in Edinburgh, said: "He was in a position of power and it's greed – naked greed. They don't care about the ordinary person, you can say what you like, they don't even think about it." Fellow shareholder Garson Gillies said: "There is another alternative and that is not to pay the pension. Find out if he will sue us." RBS warned of more job losses in the UK and internationally as it said the 2,700 announced so far this year for the UK were "not the end of the story". The bank, which is trying to cut £2.5 billion from its costs over the next three years, said it was still unclear how many redundancies would be made, but stressed it would do "all it can" to keep compulsory redundancies to a minimum.