New RBS head of risk gets a guaranteed share deal

Royal Bank of Scotland today revealed that another of its new executives will pick up a large package of free shares, on the same day it confirmed chief executive Stephen Hester could make as much as £9.7 million in pay and bonuses this year.

Unlike Hester's award, which was formally announced to the stock market this morning, Nathan Bostock's award of 1.18 million shares, which were worth £463,000 when he joined at the start of this month, come without any performance conditions attached.

RBS, which is 70%-owned by the taxpayer after last year's £20 billion bailout, said Bostock, whom Hester recruited from Abbey in February, was being awarded the shares to replace the awards he had been granted by Santander, the Spanish bank that owns Abbey.

Bostock was Abbey and Alliance & Leicester chief financial officer, and was recruited by Hester to a new role at RBS as head of restructuring and risk.

The shares will be given to him between June next year and June 2012 but are not dependent on him hitting any targets.

Hester's awards have been heavily criticised by politicians and trade unions after the bank axed 15,000 jobs with potentially the same number to go again.

But the Government's shareholder UKFI has approved the deal.