RBS plans £1bn staff bonuses... out of taxpayer bailout

Liberal Democrat Shadow Chancellor Vince Cable has hit out at the Royal Bank of Scotland's plans to pay almost £1billion in bonuses - despite being propped up with £20billion of public money.

"This is unbelievably crass and irresponsible behaviour by people who have learned absolutely nothing and appear to have no standards of honesty."

Around half of the total would be "discretionary" payments to RBS staff. RBS are "contractually" obliged to give the rest of the cash to employees of ABN Amro, the Dutch bank they bought last year in a catastrophic deal.