FT.com / Companies / Banks - UK court hosts fight over bank bonuses.
Commerzbank has gone to the UK’s High Court to strike out lawsuits brought by 104 investment bankers who claim they were entitled to receive millions of pounds in discretionary bonuses from a €400m ($520m) pool.
Adds a whole new meaning to 'discretionary', doesn't it?
Abuse of the concept of 'entitlement' because 'we're worth it' also comes to mind.
This is the banker/right wing/ Tory mindset for you.
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OK so lets forget about the rule of law sanctity of the contract. You and I may not like the action being taken by the bankers but surely they, like all good citizens, are entitled to the protection of the law if their contractual rights are being infringed.
And just what this has to do with the Tories beggers belief? Come on Richard, you are an intelligent man and such nonsense does you and your cause a complete disservice – leave dissembling to the politicians.
@Justin
Bankers are almost without exception Tories
And in case you hadn’t noticed it, all of life is political
If you have not – open your eyes fast
This simply makes no sense. If the bonuses were discretionary, there is no entitlement and no legal case. That’s just basic knowledge of English. God knows what the facts are.
“Bankers are almost without exception Tories”
Actually I think you’ll be surprised to find how many bankers voted Labour in 1997, 2001 and 2005. Labour were very popular in the City once upon a time.
I fail to see how a story about a group of bankers suing for what they believe they are legally entitled to can suddenly be construed as all bankers, just like Tories, expect wealth that they are not entitled to.
If some of you you would bother to read what the case is all about you will see that their claim is that the bonuses had progressed from being discretionary to being contractual on the grounds that they had been informed what their bonus would be. The bank maintains that they reserved the right to withdraw the bonuses through an adverse circumstances clause in the letters of notification. This is the ground for dispute.
You will also find that a number of those suing the bank are German citizens and therefore unlikely to be Tories – but whom am I to put facts in the way of a bit of political sensationalism.
Actually, it doesn’t surprise me that a lot of bankers voted for New Labour in 1997, 2001, and 2005, since, as Richard (and others) have pointed out many times, New Labour’s capitulation to neoliberal/tory/right wing economics suited the bankers down to the ground; pity about the consequences for the rest of us though.