[Mail and Globe] Chairman Philip Hampton warned on Friday as he called for an end to "public flogging" of the state-rescued bank over its past mistakes. Hampton rounded on the legacy of former chief executive Fred Goodwin, saying in a speech due to be delivered to shareholder meetings later on Friday that his takeover of Dutch rival ABN Amro had been the wrong deal at the wrong price.
Addressing widespread public anger over the pension of £703 000 pounds a year awarded to Goodwin, Hampton also said the bank was taking legal advice over the payout and that the contract of the new chief executive, Stephen Hester, ensured no more rewards for failure.
"Some of the practices that were accepted at the height of a boom when the bank was recording £10-billion profits, cannot be acceptable now if indeed they ever really were," Hampton said, pointing to sponsorship of Formula 1 motor racing and an order for a corporate jet that has now been cancelled.
Small shareholders in RBS will later on Friday get an opportunity to publicly vent anger over the lender's near collapse last year and are expected to make the largely symbolic gesture of rejecting the bank's report on 2008 executive pay.
The British government, which became majority shareholder in RBS last October after resuscitating the bank with a £20-billion injection of taxpayer's money, has already said it will vote against RBS's 2008 remuneration report.
"I do understand that many shareholders will wish to vote against or abstain on the advisory vote on the Remuneration Report to register their strong disapproval of the pension arrangements of our former chief executive," Hampton said.
Goodwin and RBS have been at the centre of public anger over the near collapse of Britain's banking system and protesters targeted one of the bank's branches during the meeting of G20 heads of government in London this week.