I‘ve been invited to comment on whether or not I think the Government should call the bluff of the RBS board who are, it seems, threatening to resign en-masse if they’re not allowed £1.5 billion worth of bonuses.

Funnily enough I think the Government should call their bluff. I don’t really care whether or not RBS staff, of whatever level, get bonuses. I’d say if they did everything expected of them then I can’t see why they wouldn’t be entitled to the same bonus they’d get if they remained in completely private ownership.

But the board resigning? Ah go on then. Why? Because they’ve been suckling on the teat of the state knowing full well what the consequences of that would be – Government stooges on the board and political interference.  The promise that the Government wouldn’t interfere in the running of the banks it took over was always an utter fiction. It was always, always inevitable that this promise would be disregarded at the slightest hint of conflict between Bank and State.

Barclays, for example, knew this all too well. They went to extraordinary lengths to find alternative sources of funding – turns out they went to the Middle East. Their funding was more expensive than that offered by the Government, and because of that they hurried to pay it back. The result was that Barclays didn’t take taxpayers money, protected their shareholders and kept the Government’s mitts off their business.

RBS, on the other hand, took the money. They shafted their shareholders completely  - and the taxpayer – and for the life of me I can’t quite work out why they haven’t all fallen on their swords long before now.

Do I approve of the political interference? Of course not. But as Lib Dem Blogger Tristan Mills once said, “People forget that in Atlas Shrugged most of the villains were businessmen.”

I want our money back, and if there’s £1.5 billion going spare there’s only one place it should be going.