Chairman: RBS still neutral on Scottish independence

ROYAL Bank of Scotland chairman Sir Philip Hampton has refused to take sides on Scottish independence ahead of September’s referendum.

Although the issue has dominated political debate on both sides of the border, not a single shareholder at a bizarrely subdued annual meeting in Edinburgh asked about the implications of a ‘Yes’ vote for the state-backed lender.

Instead Hampton, pictured, pre-empted any concerns in his opening address. He warned that a ‘Yes’ vote created a ‘great deal of uncertainty’ over areas such as ‘our credit rating, tax and regulation’.

But he emphasised: ‘We are not taking one side or the other’ and we will continue to maintain that neutral position’.

Some of the UK’s biggest companies, including Shell, BP, Lloyds and insurance giant Standard Life have voiced fears about the implications of Scottish independence. But the issue is particularly sensitive for RBS, whose headquarters have been in Edinburgh since it was founded in 1727.

Bank of England governor Mark Carney warned in March that RBS might have to move its headquarters to England, adding to fears over Scottish jobs. The bank has 12,000 staff in Scotland, including 3,000 in its sprawling Gogarburn headquarters outside Edinburgh. Shareholders voted to back bonus payouts of £576m for last year at RBS, despite it lurching to a £8.2bn loss.

Plans to hand senior staff ‘fixed allowances’ to bolster their basic packages and dodge the EU bonus cap were also approved.

Voting at the state-backed lender’s annual general meetings is a formality as the government-backed UK Financial Investments has an 81pc share of the vote.

But the UKFI was not allowed to vote on the bank’s proposals to remove a block on payment of dividends.

Long-suffering shareholders supported plans to pay the Government £1.5bn to buy out the ‘dividend access share’ held by the Treasury.

This restriction was imposed by the European Commission as part of RBS’s £45.5bn bail out.

It stipulated that the lender would have to pay a special dividend to the Treasury before rewarding shareholders.