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Reforming Financial Markets

I am not against bonuses—I meant to take the point up with the hon. Member for Twickenham—in whatever walk of life, if one can reward people for doing something special or for making an extra effort, particularly if it is designed to build the long-term strength of the bank. In the case of RBS, where there is a new management running a bank with a balance sheet that is almost the size of this country's wealth—on one view, it is the largest bank in the world—it is important that there is an incentive to help taxpayers get their money back. The hon. Gentleman asks about penalising. It will be for the FSA to look at each case to ensure that there is a bonus structure or a reward structure generally, not just at the top, but throughout the entire system, that it is built for the long term, and that there is clawback—all the conditions that we set out—otherwise it will visit the appropriate penalties. People in banks must be focused on building their banks for the long term, otherwise we will be back exactly where we started.