Sir Fred Goodwin: Give The Money Up Fred!!

Posted yesterday: More Pension Money For RBS's Sir Fred Goodwin

On the UK Sun ( Yeah, absolutely love this tabloid for its juicer footie stories. :p2 ), they are reporting that Sir Fred Goodwin is fighting for his pension: Axed RBS boss 'guards pension'

My personal feeling Sir Fred Goodwin should take a good look in the mirror and ask himself that isn't the pension money outrageously insane given the size and the magnitude of how badly RBS has screwed up under his leadership? Look at what has happened to RBS. Does he think he should be rewarded for leading RBS to where it is now?

Give the money up Fred!

Look at what the UK Government is doing just to clean up your mess. Whose money is it?

And here you are insisting that you will not voluntarily give your money up.

Don't you have any dignity left in yourself?

Come on, do the only thing that is correct.

Give the money up!!!!!

Axed RBS boss 'guards pension'

• FORMER Royal Bank of Scotland boss Sir Fred Goodwin has written to the Treasury indicating he will not voluntarily give up his pension, it was revealed tonight.
  
  Sir Fred is coming under increasing pressure to give up at least part of the pension, worth an estimated £693,000 a year.
  
  He is already receiving it at the age of 50 under an early retirement deal agreed with the RBS board when he was forced out last October.
  
  Royal Bank of Scotland's record losses in 2008 are the BIGGEST in British corporate history.
  
  Prime Minister Gordon Brown today said the Government was looking at legal action to claw back the money, insisting that there should be “no reward for failure”.
  
  But Treasury sources this evening revealed that Sir Fred has written to City minister Lord Myners to say that he is not ready to waive his entitlement.
  
  Alistair Darling said ministers only became aware of the massive payout last week.
  
  UK Financial Investments – the body which manages taxpayers’ shareholdings in the part-nationalised banks – has been asked to look into clawing back some of the pension deal.
  
  But Sir Fred could end the controversy by giving it up.
  
  "The ball is in his court," Mr Darling said.
  
  Humiliating
  
  The news comes as RBS also announced it would be putting £325billion into the Government insurance scheme against toxic assets.
  
  Derek Simpson, joint leader of Unite, said: “These historic and humiliating losses bring into sharp focus just how reckless RBS’s former management team have behaved."
  
  Mr Darling said: “You cannot justify these excesses, especially when you have got such a failure of this magnitude.”
  
  Around £20billion of RBS’s losses is linked to write-downs on the acquisition of Dutch bank ABN AMRO — led by Sir Fred two years ago.
  
  He lost his job last year when the bank was bailed out. Treasury Committee chairman John McFall said: “There should be a claw back.”
  
  The Treasury is to pump an EXTRA£13BILLION into RBS, taking its stake in the company to about 84 per cent – up from 70 per cent.
  
  RBS must make £16billion available for lending, and £9billion must be used for mortgages.
  
  Tomorrow, Mr Darling will spell out plans to insure £250BILLION of toxic debts at Lloyds.
  Underwriting the debts means ministers will have put £1.3TRILLION of our money on the line to bail-out the banks in just six months.
  
  Mr Darling said: “We want to ensure that by cleaning up the balance sheet, that by making sure RBS has enough capital, we can get through this period.”
  
  He said RBS had also announced a restructuring of the bank, identifying parts that were “core” to its future.
  
  Mr Darling went on to acknowledge that there was a cost to the taxpayer, but added that the “cost of not doing it is absolutely colossal”.
  
  “You’ll remember that when Lehmans, that was a big investment bank in America, went down, that’s what precipitated the crisis in the world’s banking system," he said.
  
  “That’s what led to every government in the world having to recapitalise those banks because they were within hours of collapse.”
  
  Treasury officials were locked in frantic talks with bosses at the banks late last night thrashing out details of the bailout.
  
  Ministers hope the move will end the uncertainty swirling round our banks.
  
  Mr Darling said yesterday he wanted the banks to “clean up their balance sheets and rebuild for the future”.
  
  Meanwhile, house prices fell by a further 1.8 per cent during February, pushing the average cost of a home back below the £150,000 threshold.
  
  Nationwide Building Society said the average property in the UK was now worth £147,746 – £31,612 less than in the same month of 2008.
  
  The annual rate at which house prices are falling also continued to accelerate to hit a new record of 17.6 per cent.