RBS' Hester defends £780k payout

Stephen Hester, chief executive of Royal Bank of Scotland(RBS), mounted a strong defence of his bonus package to MPs yesterday, despite mounting criticism of the bank's involvement in the LIBOR scandal under his watch.

Hester told the Parliamentary Commission on Banking Standards he deserved the £780,000 payout from his long-term incentive package because of the "huge things" he had achieved since arriving at the taxpayer-owned bank in 2008, the Times reports. "We have done huge things for society and stakeholders, including [managing] hundreds of billions of risk that the country was exposed to that isn't exposed to any more," Hester said. "So it is entirely proper to be assessed on the things I have done. I believe that this nation is off the hook for a lot of bad things, though not entirely off t...