Shred Fred The Shred

Special K

What a disgrace.

Temporarily lost my creative faculties and cannot dream up the kind of punishment that is morally due here. Can you help?

pneumatic

I'm not surprised. My ex-boss was one of his best friends and they both had the conscience bypass operation some years ago. People like this are the logical outcome of Thatcherism. Our crime has been not to do enough to stop it happening.

I'm sorry to say this but the word banker has become just a bit of rhyming slang. I'm sorry because my grandfather was a bank manager and all the stories I have heard suggest he did his job with wisdom and a conscience. He would certainly have been sacked from today's incarnation of the organisation he devoted his professional life to.

As for a punishment, I just hope Goodwin chokes on it.

Red Rock

He should be getting prison not a pension :evil:

Harry B

Hang on a minute. He isn't the only one to have made mistakes. He's lost his job and is unlikely to find another one any time soon. When he left RBS the government (Myers) agreed that he could keep the pension. That they failed to investigate further the terms of the pension and what powers they had to limit it is their mistake. If you enter into negotiations with someone and the other side comes out best the first thing you should look to is your own advisors, not just blame the other side.

The credit crunch is not all down to the banks. The government and banking regulators should take some of the blame. What were the FSA and FEC doing whilst all this was going on?

Fred Godwin is an easy target (especially so for the Daily Mail) but people should look a bit further

Monty Dog

Au contraire, these guys were cavalier in their management of risk and their judgement was severely impaired by their 6 figure bonuses and fat pensions. Typically, most bonuses are discretionary and not a contracted obligation - they should be paid in share options, not cash. I hope the shareholder's meeting rejects the director's remuneration packages.

Harry B

Monty Dog wrote:

Au contraire, these guys were cavalier in their management of risk and their judgement was severely impaired by their 6 figure bonuses and fat pensions. Typically, most bonuses are discretionary and not a contracted obligation - they should be paid in share options, not cash. I hope the shareholder's meeting rejects the director's remuneration packages.

Godwin has foregone his share options as well as the salary he was contractually entitled to recieve. The pension was negotiated at the time of his departure and Myers said that there was no need to make any further "gestures". To come back at him now is just an attempt to shift the publics attention. Godwin is right to tell the government to get stuffed and I would do exactly the same in such circumstances. At the end of the day this is someone's pension we are talking about. Anyone care to have a peak at Myers handsome index linked pension?

nasahapley

Harry B wrote:

To come back at him now is just an attempt to shift the publics attention. Godwin is right to tell the government to get stuffed and I would do exactly the same in such circumstances.

I agree 100%. I'd like to think that if I were in a similar position to Sir Fred I'd show contrition and forfeit a good chunk of the pension. BUT, if it were the very same government that had played its own considerable part in busting the economy (and which had already very clearly stated that I could keep the pension) which was now asking me to forfeit it in order to that they could gain some brownie points with the voters, I'd tell them to GAFT.

That Sir F can fail so spectacularly and still trouser 700k a year (or whatever it is) is outrageous enough, but the whole thing is a sideshow. The politicians get to wave their hands around and act tough, saying they'll get lawyers involved even though they know full well the pension is legally watertight, and all the while they're p***ing untold billions of our cash up the wall. It's easier too for the press to get all indignant about Sir Fred's behaviour than to understand and communicate the substance of what the government is up to now and it's management of the economy over the last decade, which is worth getting much more angry about. A pox on the lot of them.

I feel better now.

Harry B

nasahapley wrote:

Harry B wrote:

To come back at him now is just an attempt to shift the publics attention. Godwin is right to tell the government to get stuffed and I would do exactly the same in such circumstances.

I agree 100%. I'd like to think that if I were in a similar position to Sir Fred I'd show contrition and forfeit a good chunk of the pension. BUT, if it were the very same government that had played its own considerable part in busting the economy (and which had already very clearly stated that I could keep the pension) which was now asking me to forfeit it in order to that they could gain some brownie points with the voters, I'd tell them to GAFT.

That Sir F can fail so spectacularly and still trouser 700k a year (or whatever it is) is outrageous enough, but the whole thing is a sideshow. The politicians get to wave their hands around and act tough, saying they'll get lawyers involved even though they know full well the pension is legally watertight, and all the while they're p***ing untold billions of our cash up the wall. It's easier too for the press to get all indignant about Sir Fred's behaviour than to understand and communicate the substance of what the government is up to now and it's management of the economy over the last decade, which is worth getting much more angry about. A pox on the lot of them.

I feel better now.

Well said

Airwave

If i had made such an error of judgemenet in my job i would feel it was only right for me to go back & put the problem right free of charge.To take money for a such poor job only goes to show a lack of conscience.If he were a tradesmen he would be called a cowboy!It beats me how he became a knight in the first place,perhaps he wears the right tie.
I would agree that the goverment has been inept in letting the banks virtually do as they pleased for so long.Surely the wrighting was on the wall.

benji90

pneumatic wrote:

I People like this are the logical outcome of Thatcherism. .

I knew it had to be Thatchers fault somehow!

cee

I was sent a link to this site today which has a story which totally explains the whole affair....

The fact that the BBC site is not too far away from this is somewhat disturbing though.

teagar

I fear that the the emphasis on bankers is both scapegoating and distracting.

Sure there is a banking problem, but I think it's an awful lot more complicated than just imprudent borrowing/lending. If it was, then the solution would be easy enough!

It's easy to blame the bankers for it all because they own a lot etc etc, but what about the shareholders who wanted quick profts, or the regulation of the businesses which didn't understand the risks involved? What about all those rocket scientists etc who went into the world of securities and banking and devised gigantically complex ways of apparantly reducing risk, which in hindsight they didn't?

The people in banking are not just charicatures of evil greedy men. They are people just like you.

Understand that the problem is an awful lot more complex than anyone can comprehend at the moment, which is why all the very smart people are working flat out to establish precicely what happened.

Stop using scapegoats. It happened in '29, only then people took it a stage futher. Not suggesting anything so sinister will happen this time, but it's certainly not good either way.

chuckcork

Harry B wrote:

He isn't the only one to have made mistakes. He's lost his job and is unlikely to find another one any time soon.

He going to be trousering £690,000 or thereabouts for doing nothing for the rest of his life.

Thats about as much as I can expect to make from having to actually do something in the next 20 years or so.

So why would he need another job?

finchy

Wait a minute people, economic bubbles have happened before, and when they burst it's always with catastrophic consequences - from tulip bulbs to share prices, and now property. When people invest in something so that the price is inflated to way above market value, just on the basis of recouping the money in the future by selling it on to other people who are just buying for future profit.... well, we can all see the result.

Surely bankers should have known this. It's basic economics and well-known historical facts.

DavidBelcher

johnfinch wrote:

Surely bankers should have known this. It's basic economics and well-known historical facts.

Interesting snippet in Private Eye recently - it ran a short list of some top RBS/HBOS figures' names plus Terry Wogan and posed the question 'which is the odd one out'. The answer is Sir Terry, because he's the only one of them with a recognised banking qualification! :shock:

David

pneumatic

the degree of sleaze involved here is staggering. I read fred's letter to the noble lord and it seems to say that the old chap phoned fred and offered to hush the whole business up if fred did the decent thing and handed back his ill gotten gains. Fred refused this kind offer to appear decent in the public eye so the noble lord told the whole school that fred was a rotter.

These people are beyond parody. complacent, blood-sucking parasites who make up the rules as they go along.

Mike Healey

I was fired from a job as a printing machine operator, back in the early 60s because I'd cocked up a urgent print run of 10,000 leaflets for one of their biggest clients.

I don't recall anyone offering me a fat payoff and rightly so, since the mistake was entirely mine. Don't quite understand why Goodwin should be treated any different.

As for the argument that he was entitled to his contractual rights, who, exactly, negotiated that contract? Was it, by any chance Goodwin? and was it agreed by the rest of the Borad of Drectors, including the non-executive ones, who were supposed to provide the sceptical outsiders view on Goodwin et al's decisions? And was Goodwin a non-exec director for any other organisation? Don't know, but most such served as exec. directors in other companies and scratched mutual backs in agreeing their fatcat contracts.

The idea that these contracts represent some kind of holy writ which cannot be declared null and void seems to me to be absurd. What about the implied condition of Goodwin's contract that he display exemplary fiduciary responsibility for the shareholders? Such a clause was probably, and with intent aforethought, "accidently" missed out.

These people have been responsible for a catastrophic failure of the world-wide financial system through long-term, consistent decisions of such shamblingly witless, drivelling stupid, monumentally incompetent, mindbogglingly inept, complacent ignorance and yet still have the nerve to bleat about their contractual rights and the lawyers who helped draw up these self-serving odes to greed now crawl out of the woodwork in their support.

Goodwin and his ilk are slimy, slithering, creeping, crawling, supperating, deliquescing, pus-filled sacks of smug, self-satisfied, maggot wriggling greed and selfishness.

The idea that he deserves to be paid, annually, a pension that it would take someone on the minimum wage about 55-60 years to earn is a moral offence of the highest order and stinks to the heavens.

Yes, he's but one of god knows how many, but to argue that he is only a scapegoat is an argument which misses the point - none of them deserve a penny and any that have been paid anything other than their last month's salary in lieu of notice should return it.

downfader

Speaking as a bloke on the bottom rung of a ladder I see this from a particular perspective. On one had it does seem to me that his pension is immoral, but not illegal - therefore he is surely not obligated to had anything back.. and with respect to this whole banking nonsense worldwide - when I hear workmates talk about taking out loans to go on holiday or lying about their income (easy to check I'd reckon) being a little over what it actually is to get that morgage - males me feel the blame is society wide, not just the guys in London and running the banks. :?

What we have to remember is that people are generally idiots and at best lazy. There is a lot to be said for old saying such as eggs and baskets.

finchy

Mike Healey wrote:

What about the implied condition of Goodwin's contract that he display exemplary fiduciary responsibility for the shareholders? Such a clause was probably, and with intent aforethought, "accidently" missed out.


Goodwin and his ilk are slimy, slithering, creeping, crawling, supperating, deliquescing, pus-filled sacks of smug, self-satisfied, maggot wriggling greed and selfishness.

The shareholders have benefitted from years of massive bonuses, and now the government (ie taxpayer) steps in to bail them out when it all goes wrong. The bankers did a wonderful job for their shareholders, it's just everybody else who loses out big time.

Your rant - SPOT ON!

Sirius631

RBS was only saved by the Government to protect their votes in Scotland. With the loss that they made, the only natural conculsion to RBS would have been to let it go bang. Instead, the Government talked Lloyds TBS into taking it on, putting Lloyds into difficulty.

Cunobelin

Bleed the World

Frank the tank

It's the ugliest face of capitalism but, that is the world we live in I'm affraid. Those at the top for all their pontificating and bluff and bluster don't give a toss about the masses. It's all about feathering your own nest and f**k the ordinary less privilaged among us.

No I'm not advocating a communist state, just one that's more fair. One where everyone is aware of their responsibilities. I'm the first to critisicise the Karen Matthews etc in society but those at the top are equally as guilty of creating a society which is totally imbalanced and devoid of morals and the honest hardworking majoirity are the ones being abused by both ends of the social scale.

Captain Fagor

The Prime Minister's Office has responded to the epetition on the Number10 website to strip Fred Goodwin of his knighthood, see link:

http://www.number10.gov.uk/Page19787

It looks a typically wishy-washy and evasive response....