Royal Bank of Scotland chief executive Stephen Hester's £963,000 bonus has been attacked as "out of touch" by Labour, as a government minister claimed he had a public "duty" to refuse it.
Although his payout was limited to around 60 per cent of the maximum following intense political pressure, Hester, who has a salary of £1.2 million, could get 3.6 million shares in the bailed-out financial institution, which is 83 per cent state owned.
It is less than half the value of last year's all-shares bonus and comes after Prime Minister David Cameron made clear he expected the bonus to be "a lot less" than in 2011.
Treasury sources said they were pleased at the reduction on the previous bonus and that the Government's view had been "made very clear" over recent weeks.
However the Opposition said that the scale of the payout showed the Government was "desperately out of touch" with voters and not serious about reining in executive pay.
Concern was also raised by Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg's chief political adviser Norman Lamb who said he would be "deeply uncomfortable with a bonus of that size", while his Liberal Democrat colleague Jeremy Browne appealed to Mr Hester to refuse to take the shares.
Subscribe