RBS could refer to:

Art

Rolling Ball Sculpture

Royal British Society of Sculptors

Banking

Royal Bank of Scotland - Scottish high street bank

* Royal Bank of Scotland Group - A majority British state owned Scottish holding company, which owns Royal Bank of Scotland, NatWest and others

Broadcasting

Radio Base Station

RBS TV, a Brazilian regional television network

Computers

Role based security

Rule-based system

Defence

RBS-15, a long-range fire-and-forget surface-to-surface and air-to-surface, anti-ship missile.

RBS-70, an air-defence weapon

Education

Regent's Business School

Robert Browning School

Rotterdam Business School

Royal Ballet School

Rutgers Business School

Riga Business School

Project management

Resource Breakdown Structure

Risk breakdown structure

Miscellaneous

FC Red Bull Salzburg, an Austrian football club

Ramat Beit Shemesh

Regionalverkehr Bern Solothurn - Railway Operator in Switzerland

Revised British Standard, a bullhead rail profile

Ribosomal Binding Site

Richard Brinsley Sheridan

Robbed-bit signaling

Rutherford backscattering spectrometry (analytical technique)

de:RBS fr:RBS it:RBS nl:RBS ja:RBS

Coordinates	26°08′9″N80°08′31″N
Name	Stephen Hester
Birth date	December 14, 1960
Occupation	Chief Executive Officer
Salary	£1.2 million }}

Stephen Hester (born 14 December 1960), is currently the Chief Executive Officer of The Royal Bank of Scotland Group.

Early life

Hester is the eldest son of a university professor. He was educated at Easingwold School in North Yorkshire a rural comprehensive school, and at Oxford where he studied at Lady Margaret Hall, Oxford, and after chairing the Tory Reform Group, graduated with a first class honours degree in Philosophy, Politics and Economics.

Career

Hester began his career in 1982 with Credit Suisse, where he started as chairman’s assistant. In 1996 he was appointed to the executive board. Hester held the position of Chief Financial Officer and Head of Support Division, until May 2000. From May 2000 to September 2001, he was Head of Fixed Income Division.

In May 2002 he joined Abbey National as Finance Director. He then went on to become Chief Operating Officer, a position he held until November 2004, when he was appointed Chief Executive of British Land. In early 2007, eight months before British Land and others REIT's were caught in the commercial property slump, he said: "I don't believe we are about to see a market decline, but the period of sharp growth is over."

Hester was appointed non-executive deputy chairman of the newly-nationalised Northern Rock by Chancellor of the Exchequer Alistair Darling in March 2008, a role which he resigned from in September 2008 to take a non-executive position on the board of Royal Bank of Scotland.

Royal Bank of Scotland

In November 2008 he left British Land and on 21 November 2008 replaced Sir Fred Goodwin as Chief Executive of the RBS Group. Hester is paid an annual salary of £1.2 million by RBS. Alongside this, he took home £7.7m in bonus and pension payments

In December, 2009, the board of RBS, in which the general public has an 84% stake, threatened to resign unless they were permitted to pay bonuses of £1.5bn to staff in its investment arm. The matter received heavy criticism because it followed a £850bn taxpayer bailout of the banking sector. The Chancellor of the Exchequer, Alistair Darling, said he would not be "held to ransom".

Personal life

Hester's is presently separated from his wife, fellow banker the Canadian Barbara Abt. The couple, who met while both working at Credit Suisse, have two children. The family home is in Holland Park, west London, and also have a but also 350 acre estate in Oxfordshire, Broughton Grange. One of Hester's passions is said to be the garden of Broughton Grange and development of its arboretum, which was designed by landscape architect Tom Stuart-Smith and includes pleached limes, formal beds and five of the first batch of Australian Wollemi pines ever to be brought into the UK. Hester is a trustee of the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew.

Hester enjoys tennis, running, shooting and skiing, which for the latter he owns a chalet in Verbier, Switzerland. Hester also enjoys horse riding, as his wife is a master of fox hounds in Warwickshire: "it’s very important to keep our marriage together that I do the same as she does."

References

External links

Broughton Grange official website

|-

Category:1960 births Category:Living people Category:Alumni of Lady Margaret Hall, Oxford Category:British chief executives Category:Royal Bank of Scotland Group

Coordinates	26°08′9″N80°08′31″N
honorific-prefix	The Right Honourable
name	The Lord McFall of Alcluith
honorific-suffix	PC
constituency mp	West DunbartonshireDumbarton (1987–2005)
predecessor	Ian Campbell
successor	Gemma Doyle
term start	11 June 1987
term end	6 May 2010
birth date	October 04, 1944
birth place	Glasgow, Scotland
nationality	Scottish
party	Labour Co-operative
alma mater	University of Strathclyde, Open University
website	www.johnmcfall.com
footnotes	}}

John Francis McFall, Baron McFall of Alcluith (born 4 October 1944) is a British Labour Co-operative politician. He was a Member of Parliament (MP) from 1987 to 2010, first for Dumbarton and then from 2005 for West Dunbartonshire. He was best known for being the chairman of the House of Commons Treasury Committee during which he referred Prime Minister Gordon Brown as Chancellor.

Early life

McFall went to a boys' school, St Patrick's Secondary School (since merged with Notre Dame High School to form Our Lady & St Patrick's High School), on Hawthornhill Road in Castlehill, Dumbarton, leaving without any qualifications at 15. His father was a school caretaker and his mother had a newsagents shop, which sparked his (later) interest in how to run businesses. He worked for the local Parks Department in Dumbarton and then in a factory. At the age of 24, he studied at Paisley College of Technology (now the University of the West of Scotland) receiving a BSc in Chemistry. In 1977 he wanted to widen his knowledge away from science and obtained a BA from the Open University in Education and Philosophy. He was a chemistry and maths teacher from 1974-87 in Dumbarton, Kirkintilloch and Glasgow, becoming a deputy-head in Glasgow and Secretary of his Constituency Labour Party before he entered Parliament. Whilst a teacher he completed a part-time course over three years at the University of Strathclyde for an MBA. In 1994, he became a Visiting Professor at Strathclyde University Business School, and now is a member of the Strategic Advisory Board at the University of Glasgow Business School. He is a member of the GMB Union.

Political career

He was first elected for the Dumbarton constituency, Scotland, at the 1987 general election, after the previous MP, Ian Campbell retired. His original majority was a little over 2,000. Dumbarton constituency was replaced with the new West Dunbartonshire constituency for the 2005 general election, which McFall won with a majority over 12,500.

He was a whip and junior minister (for Education, Training and Employment, Health and Community Relations, then in 1999 for Economy and Education) at the Northern Ireland Office from 1998-9.

In 2001 he was appointed Chair of the Treasury Select Committee, and reappointed for a second term in this position in 2005. The committee conducted inquiries into the banking crisis, producing evidence of the bonus culture, the lack of banking qualifications among many top bankers and poor oversight of the industry by the Financial Services Authority.

On 29 January 2010, McFall announced his intention to stand down as an MP at the 2010 general election.

On 17 June 2010, he was created a life peer as Baron McFall of Alcluith, of Dumbarton in the County of Dunbartonshire, and was introduced in the House of Peers on 6 July 2010.

He is currently the Vice-Chair of the All-Party Parliamentary Group on Overseas Development (Apgood)

Other

He is Chair of the Scotch Whisky and Spirits APPG and of the Royal Navy APPG.

He is Chairman of Strathleven Regeneration Company (which he helped to set up) and of Clydebank re-built, two development companies based in his constituency.

He gave his backing to Dumpster Kids, a not-for-profit organisation aimed at rescuing abandoned children, in January 2011.

Personal life

He is married to Joan, a teacher from Dumbarton, with four children. He has run marathons, although not in the last ten years.

Publications

Workplace Retirement Income Commission, ''Building a Strong, Stable and Transparent Pension System: Final Report'' (August 2011)

See also

2008 United Kingdom bank rescue package

References

External links

Official Website

Guardian Unlimited Politics - Ask Aristotle: John McFall MP

TheyWorkForYou.com - John McFall MP

BBC Politics Profile

Treasury Select Committee

News items

4 May 2008 - Treasury hard man is really a softy at heart

20 April 2008 - Norwich Union with-profits: Deadlocked

19 April 2008 - John McFall urges clarity on tax rates

15 April 2008 - John McFall speaks about abolition of 10p tax rate

7 April 2008 - Government must gauge effect of winter heating payments on fuel poverty

26 March 2008 - John McFall speaks about Northern Rock regulator's failure on BBC Breakfast

10 March 2008 - Added value

5 March 2008 - Helping people back into work

3 March 2008 - McFall cut up credit card over insurance letters

3 March 2008 - Banks "refused to believe the good times were about to end"

''Telegraph'' interview December 2007

Criticising banks in 2006 for being unsympathetic

Advising that bank ATMs should explicitly mention charges in 2005

Little praise for the savings industry in 2004

Talking about endowment mortgage shortfalls in 2004

High credit card charges in 2003

Confusing bank charges in 2002

New Economy minister in Northern Ireland in 1999

Wanting lifelong learning in Northern Ireland in 1998

Video clips

His YouTube channel

Category:1944 births Category:Alumni of the Open University Category:Alumni of the University of Strathclyde Category:Alumni of the University of the West of Scotland Category:Labour Co-operative MPs Category:Living people Category:Members of the Privy Council of the United Kingdom Category:Members of the United Kingdom Parliament for Scottish constituencies Category:People from Dumbarton Category:Scottish Roman Catholics Category:Scottish schoolteachers Category:UK MPs 1987–1992 Category:UK MPs 1992–1997 Category:UK MPs 1997–2001 Category:UK MPs 2001–2005 Category:UK MPs 2005–2010 Category:Labour Co-operative life peers

de:John McFall, Baron McFall of Alcluith la:Ioannes McFall

Coordinates	26°08′9″N80°08′31″N
Name	Sir Fred Goodwin
Birth date	August 17, 1958
Birth place	Paisley, Renfrewshire, Scotland
Birth name	Frederick Anderson Goodwin
Known for	Chief Executive of Royal Bank of Scotland, 2001 - 2009
Occupation	Chartered accountant
Nationality	}}

Sir Frederick Anderson Goodwin CA, FCIBS (born 17 August 1958) is a Scottish chartered accountant and former banker who was chief executive of the Royal Bank of Scotland Group (RBS) between 2001 and 2009.

From 2000 until 2008 he presided over RBS's rapid rise to global prominence as the world's largest company (by assets - £1.9 trillion), and fifth-largest bank by stock market value and its even more rapid fall as RBS was forced into effective nationalisation in 2008.

On October 11, 2008, Goodwin officially announced his resignation as Chief Executive and an early retirement, effective from January 31, 2009 - a month before RBS announced that its 2008 loss totalled £24.1bn, the largest annual loss in UK corporate history. Following the February 2009 disclosure of his approximately £700,000 per year pension award from RBS he was the subject of widespread public, political and media criticism.

Since January 2010, he has been employed as a senior adviser to RMJM, an international architecture firm.

Biography and career

Born in Paisley, Renfrewshire, Goodwin is the son of a Scottish electrician and was the first of his family to go to university, attending Paisley Grammar School before studying law at Glasgow University. He joined accountants Touche Ross, and qualified as a chartered accountant in 1983. Between 1985 and 1987 he was part of a Touche Ross management consultant team at Rosyth Dockyard, and became a partner in Touche Ross in 1988. He was appointed a director of Short Brothers, and tasked with preparing the largest industrial employer in Northern Ireland for its 1989 privatisation. For Touche Ross he headed the worldwide liquidation of Bank of Credit and Commerce International after its collapse in July 1991. At 32, Goodwin was in charge of 1,000 people with teams from London to Abu Dhabi and the Cayman Islands that eventually returned over half the money from one of the most complicated, high-profile financial frauds ever.

His move into banking came through his work at Touche Ross with the National Australia Bank, contributing due diligence to its 1987 takeover of Clydesdale Bank from the then Midland Bank and again with its 1995 takeover of Yorkshire Bank. During work on the latter he caught the eye of National Australia Bank executive Don Argus, and was invited to become deputy chief executive of Clydesdale in 1995, and as per his "five-second rule", accepted on the spot rising to chief executive of National Australia's British banking operations in 1996. Around this time he gained the moniker "Fred the Shred" from City financiers, reflecting a reputation for ruthlessly generating cost savings and efficiencies whilst at Clydesdale. He was later described as "a corporate Attila", having gained a reputation in the City for being a fearsome outsider - being Scottish, and not educated at a public school or at Oxbridge - who made raids in the south and abroad when it suited him.

He joined Royal Bank of Scotland in 1998 as deputy CEO to then-Chairman Sir George Mathewson, who had ambitions to make RBS a major player rather than a regional bank. RBS made waves in 2000 with its £23.6bn takeover of NatWest, a bank three times its size. Although Goodwin's predecessor Mathewson led the deal, it was Goodwin's diligence and ability to impress investors which secured it against fierce competition from the Bank of Scotland. The ''Sunday Times'' wrote that "The NatWest deal was the making of Goodwin," with Goodwin promoted to CEO in January 2001, soon after it was secured, dedicated to continuing Mathewson's vision. Goodwin lived up to his reputation, cutting 18,000 jobs by merging parts of RBS and NatWest.

CEO of RBS (2001 - 2008)

Expansion

After the purchase of NatWest, RBS made a string of further acquisitions around the world, including the purchase of Irish mortgage provider First Active and UK insurers Churchill Insurance and Direct Line. During negotiations with Credit Suisse over the acquisition of Churchill, it is said that Goodwin maintained silence for an hour at lunch with Credit Suisse's CEO, supporting his demand for indemnity against any potential losses from with the associated The Accident Group, which would collapse soon after. He got his way. RBS also bulked up its US Citizens Financial Group, Inc arm with a string of further deals. Then in May 2004, RBS said it would purchase Charter One Financial Inc. of Cleveland, Ohio for $10.5 billion. The deal, at a price "widely considered too high" spread the RBS's banking web across the Midwest for the first time, and made its U.S. banking operations No. 7 in the United States.

From the time that Goodwin took over as chief executive until 2007, RBS's assets quadrupled, its cost-to-income ratio improved markedly, and its profits soared. In 2006 pre-tax profits climbed 16% to £9.2 billion with significant growth coming from its investment banking business. By 2008 RBS was the fifth-largest bank in the world by market capitalisation. One of the factors in its rise was its enthusiasm for supporting leveraged buyouts. In 2008 it lent $9.3bn, more than double its nearest rival.

However, following investor unrest in the build-up to RBS's acquisition of a $1.6bn minority stake in Bank of China in 2005 Goodwin was criticised by some RBS shareholders for putting global expansion ahead of short-term financial returns. Between 2002 and 2005 the share price plateaued at around £17 per share, having nearly trebled between February 2000 and May 2002. Goodwin was accused of megalomania by some shareholders, as reported by Dresdner Kleinwort analyst James Eden (who said he thought the label was 'unwarranted'). After the Bank of China deal, he was forced to promise RBS shareholders he would not indulge in any further big acquisitions and focus instead on growing the group organically.

However, in early 2007 Dutch bank ABN Amro was under pressure from hedge funds, including Chris Hohn of the hedge fund TCI, to break itself up in order to maximise shareholder value. ABN chief executive Rijkman Groenink suspected RBS of acting in concert with the hedge fund Tosca, which was chaired by former RBS Chairman Mathewson and recommended the takeover bid of an RBS consortium, against the proposed merger with Barclays Bank. Goodwin arranged a consortium of RBS, Fortis and former RBS shareholders Grupo Santander, to purchase the assets of ABN Amro and break them up in a three-way split. According to the proposed deal, RBS would take over ABN's Chicago operations, LaSalle Bank, and ABN's wholesale operations; while Santander would take the Brazilian operations and Fortis the Dutch operations. In a manoeuvre "labelled in all quarters as a poison pill" ABN Amro agreed to sell key RBS target LaSalle to Bank of America for $21bn, but in July 2007 the consortium offered the same $98bn for ABN's remaining assets, with a higher cash component (93%). The deal was struck in October 2007 as the global liquidity crisis began to develop, with Barclays withdrawing its EUR61bn bid and ABN's shareholders endorsing the EUR71bn RBS takeover. Coming after the nationalisation of Northern Rock due to the freezing of the wholesale money markets, the deal proved the final straw for RBS, as it severely weakened its balance sheet not only through the size of the acquisition but due to ABN Amro's substantial exposure to the US subprime mortgage crisis.

Collapse

Goodwin's strategy of aggressive expansion primarily through acquisition, including the takeover of ABN AMRO, eventually proved disastrous and led to the near-collapse of RBS in the October 2008 liquidity crisis. The EUR 71bn (£55bn) ABN AMRO deal (of which RBS's share was £10bn ) in particular stretched the bank's capital position - £16.8bn of RBS's record £24.1bn loss is attributed to writedowns relating to the takeover of ABN AMRO.

It was not, however, the sole source of RBS's problems, as RBS was exposed to the liquidity crisis in a number of ways, particularly through US subsidiaries including RBS Greenwich Capital. Although the takeover of NatWest launched RBS's meteoric rise, it came with an investment bank subsidiary, Greenwich NatWest. RBS was unable to dispose of it as planned as a result of the involvement of the NatWest Three in the collapse of Enron. However the business (now RBS Greenwich Capital) started making money, and under pressure of comparison with rapidly-growing competitors such as Barclays Capital, saw major expansion in 2005-7, not least in private equity loans and in the sub-prime mortgage market. It became one of the top three underwriters of collateralised debt obligations (CDOs). This increased exposure to the eventual "credit crunch" contributed to RBS's financial problems.

The third contributor to RBS's problems was its liquidity position. From a position c. 2002 where the bank was essentially 'fully funded' (i.e. was funding its lending positions fully from deposits gathered from customers), the rapid growth in lending within the GBM (Global Banking and Markets) division led to a reliance on external wholesale funding. The combination of this, along with the weak equity capital position, and the massive exposure to losses on CDOs via Greenwich, were the factors that destroyed RBS.

Following two rights issues in 2008, Goodwin resigned as Chief Executive. The bank experienced severe financial problems, and attempted to shore up its balance sheet with a £12bn share issue in April 2008, one of the largest in UK corporate history. The attempt to raise an additional £7bn capital by selling off insurers Churchill and Direct Line failed due to lack of interest in the context of the global liquidity crisis. Ultimately RBS was forced in October 2008 to rely on a UK Government bank rescue package to support a shareholder recapitalisation of the bank, which resulted in the government owning a majority of the shares.

On 13 October 2008, as part of the arrangement for government support (of which Goodwin said "This isn’t a negotiation, it’s a drive-by shooting"), it was announced that Goodwin was to stand down as CEO, to be replaced by Stephen Hester. Goodwin formally left RBS on 1 January 2009. According to the ''Daily Mail'', Goodwin had been 'regarded by analysts as among the most arrogant figures in the City'. The share price, when he became CEO of RBS, in January 2001, was 442p. After reaching £18 a share (equivalent to £6 per share after each share was split into three in May 2007), on the day of his departure it was announced that the share price was 65.70p reflecting share buybacks, rights issues as well as market valuation.

Despite these developments, the ''Daily Telegraph'' insisted that "his grasp of finance is in the Alpha class" and that he was "unlikely to be in the growing queue of jobless bankers" for long. In 2008/9, the RBS group was effectively nationalised: the UK Government owns nearly 70% of the ordinary shares of the company owing to its enormous debts. By January 2009 the share price was more than 98% down from its February 2007 peak.

Awards

December 2002 - ''Forbes'' (global edition) "Businessman of the Year", which described him as an original thinker with a fast-forward frame of mind who had transformed RBS from a nonentity into a global name.

2003 - 2006 - No.1 in ''Scotland on Sunday'''s Power 100

December 2003 - "European Banker of the Year" in 2003

June 2004 - Knighted in the Queen's 2004 Birthday Honours list, for services to banking. July 2008 - awarded an honorary fellowship by the London Business School

Media commentary and criticism

During Goodwin's tenure as CEO he attracted some criticism for lavish spending, including expenditure on the construction of a £350m headquarters at Gogarburn outside Edinburgh opened by the Queen in 2005 (described by one commentator as "comically expensive",) and $500m headquarters in the US begun in 2006 as well as the use of a Dassault Falcon 900 jet owned by RBS leasing subsidiary Lombard for occasional corporate travel. Revelations that RBS had spent £200m on celebrity endorsements also went down badly.

In February 2009, RBS reported that while Sir Fred was at the helm it had posted a loss of £24.1bn, the biggest loss in UK corporate history. His responsibility for the expansion of RBS, which led to the losses, has drawn widespread criticism. During questioning by the Treasury Select Committee of the House of Commons on 10 February 2009, it emerged that Goodwin had no technical bank training and no formal banking qualifications.

In January 2009. ''The Guardian'''s City editor Julia Finch identified him as one of twenty-five people who were at the heart of the financial meltdown. Nick Cohen described Goodwin in ''The Observer'' as "the characteristic villain of our day", who made £20m from RBS and left the taxpayer "with an unlimited liability for the cost of cleaning up the mess". An online column by Daniel Gross labelled Goodwin "The World's Worst Banker", a phrase repeated elsewhere in the media. Gordon Prentice MP argued that his knighthood should be revoked as it is "wholly inappropriate and anomalous for someone to retain such a reward in these circumstances." A Labour MP from Scotland, Jim Sheridan, repeated the suggestion, and added that the police should investigate the activities of senior bankers.

In November 2009 as Goodwin emerged in public for the first time in months, it was revealed that he had hired Phil Hall the former editor of ''Hello!'' magazine, to help him rebuild his damaged reputation. Speaking to the ''Daily Mail'', Hall said "...he knows that what he did has caused problems...He is in a pretty difficult situation. He's not a criminal...You don't realise the impact all this is having on him and his family. He just wants to get his children through this - that's his only concern."

Size of pension

Media and government criticism increased on disclosure in February 2009 of the size of Goodwin's pension. The treasury minister Lord Myners had indicated to RBS that there should be "no reward for failure", but Goodwin's pension entitlement, represented by a notional fund of £8m, was doubled, to a notional fund of £16m or more, because under the terms of the scheme he was entitled to receive, at age 50, benefits which would otherwise have been available to him only if he had worked until age 60. Sir Philip Hampton, RBS's new chairman, stated that as a result Goodwin is drawing £693,000 a year (later revised to £703,000 due to Goodwin working an extra month in the new financial year), and disclosed that under the RBS pension scheme Goodwin is entitled to draw the pension already, at age 50, because he had been asked to leave employment early, rather than having been dismissed. A pensions expert suggested that this meant Goodwin had received a substantial payoff from his early retirement, as it would cost around £25m to buy such a pension and his pension 'pot' amounted to £16m. When the matter became public in late February 2009, Goodwin defended his decision to refuse to reduce his pension entitlement in a letter to Lord Myners on 26 February, pointing out that on leaving in October 2008 he had given up a contractual 12-month notice period worth around £1.29m and share options worth around £300,000. In March 2009 Lord Myners revealed that part of the reason Goodwin's pension was so large was that RBS treated him as having joined the pension scheme from age 20 (instead of 40, when he actually joined) and ignored contributions to his pension from previous employment.

Stephen Timms, a government finance minister, protested publicly about the matter. He said that it would be referred to the UK Financial Investments Limited. The Chancellor, Alistair Darling, ordered lawyers to explore legal avenues to recover the money, - though the legal options appear to be limited - and Prime Minister Gordon Brown declared that "a very substantial part of it [Goodwin's pension] should be returned." Former deputy PM John Prescott called on the government to withdraw Goodwin's pension and tell Goodwin to "sue if you dare." Liberal Democrats Treasury spokesman Vince Cable said that "What the government could do is say that if the company had gone bust, which it would have had it not been a bank, he would have been entitled to a compassionate payout of £27,000 a year, and if he does not like that he could sue." Cable added that Goodwin "obviously has got no sense of shame."

In evidence to the Treasury Select Committee on 3 March 2009 John Kingman, CEO of UK Financial Investments Ltd, the company set up to manage the government's holdings in banks, directly blamed the Royal Bank of Scotland board for awarding its former CEO a discretionary pension. Kingman said that the government was aware of the size of the pension pot in October 2008 (before UKFI was established), but that "what the government was not told was that this payment was in any way discretionary". He accused the RBS board of not sharing material facts with Financial Services Secretary Lord Myners. RBS could have terminated Sir Fred's contract as CEO with 12 months' notice, so avoiding the more expensive pension award. Kingman told the committee that UKFI was investigating whether RBS had "full knowledge of the alternatives" when it granted Sir Fred his pension. A letter from RBS setting out the background to the October 2008 decision on Goodwin's employment termination, the corporate approval process of the pension award and HM Treasury involvement was submitted to the Treasury Select Committee. Had he been dismissed instead of accepting early retirement, the annual pension would have been £416,000, payable from age 60.

His home in Edinburgh was vandalised on March 25, 2009 by an anti-banking group apparently known as "Bank Bosses Are Criminals" according to a newspaper who were sent details of the attack by the group. In their message, they said

Several windows in his house were smashed, and a car damaged in the drive below.

On 18 June 2009 RBS stated that following negotiation an agreement was reached between RBS and Goodwin to reduce his pension to £342,500 a year from the £555,000 set in February after he took out an estimated £2.7m tax-free lump sum. The agreement followed the completion of RBS' internal inquiry into Goodwin's conduct, which found no wrong-doing.

Super injunction

On 10 March 2011, John Hemming, a backbench Liberal Democrat MP, referred in Parliament to the supposed existence of "a superinjunction preventing [Goodwin] from being identified as a banker". As a result, newspapers including ''The Guardian'', ''The Independent'', and ''The Daily Telegraph'', reported that Goodwin had obtained such an injunction, while still remaining unable to explain what information the injunction restricted the publication of.

On 19 May 2011, Lord Stoneham, speaking in the House of Lords, asked the Government "how can it be right for a super-injunction to hide the alleged relationship between Sir Fred Goodwin and a senior colleague?". Later that day, the High Court varied the order, allowing Goodwin's name to be published, but continued it in relation to the identity of the lady involved. In his judgment, Mr Justice Tugendhat noted that the order had not been a superinjunction as it had been published in anonymised form on the British and Irish Legal Information Institute website. He also stated that the injunction had not prevented Goodwin being identified as a banker, but instead prevented the person applying for the injunction from being identified as a banker, and that this was done because "if the applicant were identified as a banker that would be likely to lead to his being named, which would defeat the purpose of granting him anonymity". The judge criticised press reporting of the case as including "misleading and inaccurate statements".

Other activities

Goodwin has chaired various government task forces including one examining the work of credit unions and the New Deal programme. He is a former president of the Chartered Institute of Bankers in Scotland. Goodwin became chairman of The Prince's Trust in 2003. It was announced in January 2009 that his tenure would not be renewed for another three-year term, which he left in June 2009.

In January 2009 it was rumoured that Goodwin was being considered as a replacement for Max Mosley as President of the FIA (Formula One's governing body) as Mosley was due to step down in 2009. Goodwin, a motoring enthusiast, had been "instrumental" in RBS's sponsorship deal with the Williams Formula One team. In February 2009 RBS announced that the £10m-a-year deal, struck in 2005, would end in 2010, as part of a strategic review of all sponsorship activity.

Personal life

In 1990 Goodwin married Joyce Elizabeth McLean, and they have two children. One of his hobbies is restoring classic cars - the first, a Hillman Imp, bought from the proceeds of a summer job; another, a Triumph Stag he spent years restoring. He is also a keen golfer and Formula One racing fan. Other pastimes include shooting - once a year he would go on shooting trips to Spain with Santander chairman Emilio Botín.

In August 2011, Goodwin moved out of his family home after being asked to leave by his wife. The move followed media reports of his extra-marital affair with a colleague at the Royal Bank of Scotland.

See also

2008 United Kingdom bank rescue package

Tom McKillop

UK Financial Investments Limited

2011 British privacy injunctions controversy

References

External links

''Business Week'' 7 June 2004, Profile of Fred Goodwin

''The Guardian'' Sir Fred Goodwin section

''TimesOnline'' Payback time for culture of greed - detailed background on the pension controversy

|-

Category:Royal Bank of Scotland Group Category:Scottish accountants Category:Scottish chief executives Category:Knights Bachelor Category:Alumni of the University of Glasgow Category:People educated at Paisley Grammar School Category:People from Paisley Category:1958 births Category:Living people Category:Scottish bankers Category:Scottish knights Category:British management consultants

fr:Fred Goodwin nl:Fred Goodwin