{"id":5440,"date":"2009-11-29T16:59:30","date_gmt":"2009-11-29T14:59:30","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.taxresearch.org.uk\/Blog\/2009\/11\/29\/the-royal-bank-of-sustainability\/"},"modified":"2009-11-29T16:59:30","modified_gmt":"2009-11-29T14:59:30","slug":"the-royal-bank-of-sustainability","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.taxresearch.org.uk\/Blog\/2009\/11\/29\/the-royal-bank-of-sustainability\/","title":{"rendered":"The Royal Bank of Sustainability"},"content":{"rendered":"

From the Observer, today<\/a>:<\/p>\n

\n

A year ago this weekend, the British taxpayer became the largest shareholder in the Royal Bank of Scotland. But 12 months and \u00a356bn since the initial recapitalisation, we believe that the Treasury has failed to push RBS and the other bailed-out banks towards supporting the investments our country needs. In doing so, the government has effectively written a blank cheque for the rescued banks to finance anything from destructive fossil fuel companies driving climate change to hostile take-overs that threaten UK jobs.<\/p>\n

The Treasury's inaction on these issues ultimately works against the government's objectives on a range of issues, including job creation, energy, healthcare and climate change. Nor will this "business as usual" approach generate financial benefit to taxpayers, as it is we who will, once again, ultimately have to pick up the tab for the banks' reckless lending practices.<\/p>\n

It is not too late to transform RBS into a Royal Bank of Sustainability, ensuring that it and other publicly backed banks help pay for Britain's transition from a high-carbon economy with rising unemployment to a low carbon-society that provides millions of green jobs and better public services.<\/p>\n

Alan Simpson MP<\/strong><\/p>\n

Andrew Simms<\/strong>, policy director of the New Economics Foundation<\/p>\n

Billy Hayes<\/strong>, general secretary, Communications Workers Union<\/p>\n

Iain Banks<\/strong>, novelist<\/p>\n

Neal Lawson<\/strong>, chair, Compass<\/p>\n

Tony Juniper<\/strong>, environmental campaigner<\/p>\n

Caroline Lucas<\/strong> MEP<\/p>\n

Prof<\/strong> Robert Wade<\/strong>, London School of Economics<\/p>\n

Ann Pettifor, campaigns director, Operation Noah<\/strong><\/p>\n

Catherine Howarth<\/strong>, director, Fair Pensions<\/p>\n

Chris Dunham<\/strong>, director, Carbon Descent<\/p>\n

Colin Challen<\/strong> MP<\/p>\n

Colin Hines<\/strong>, convenor of the Green New Deal Group<\/p>\n

Prof Costas Lapavitsas<\/strong>, Economics Department, SOAS<\/p>\n

Deborah Doane<\/strong>, director, World Development Movement<\/p>\n

Prof Diane Elson<\/strong>, Department of Sociology, University of Essex<\/p>\n

Duncan McLaren<\/strong>, director, Friends of the Earth Scotland<\/p>\n

Geoff Nettleton<\/strong>, Indigenous Peoples Links<\/p>\n

Gordon Roddick<\/strong><\/p>\n

Howard Reed<\/strong>, director, Landman Economics<\/p>\n

Rev Ian Galloway<\/strong>, convener, Church and Society Council, Church of Scotland<\/p>\n

Ian Leggett<\/strong>, director, People & Planet<\/p>\n

Jeni McKay<\/strong>, director, Scottish Education and Action for Development<\/p>\n

Jeremy Leggett<\/strong>, chair, Solar Aid<\/p>\n

Johan Frijns<\/strong>, coordinator, BankTrack<\/p>\n

John Hilary<\/strong>, director, War on Want<\/p>\n

Kevin Smith<\/strong>, partner, PLATFORM<\/p>\n

Martin Salters<\/strong> MP<\/p>\n

Miles Litvinoff<\/strong>, coordinator, the Ecumenical Council for Corporate Responsibility<\/p>\n

Nick Dearden<\/strong>, director, Jubilee Debt Campaign<\/p>\n

Nick Silver<\/strong>, director, Callund Consulting Limited<\/p>\n

Patrick Harvie<\/strong>, Green MSP for Glasgow<\/p>\n

Richard Murphy<\/strong>, Tax Justice Network<\/p>\n

Dr Simon Lewis<\/strong>, Royal Society Research Fellow, University of Leeds<\/p>\n

Dr Stuart Parkinson<\/strong>, executive director, Scientists for Global Responsibility<\/p>\n

Prof Tim Lang<\/strong>, London City University<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

From the Observer, today: A year ago this weekend, the British taxpayer became the largest shareholder in the Royal Bank of Scotland. But 12 months
 Read the full article…<\/em><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[70,35,74],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5440","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-banking","category-economics","category-green-new-deal"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.taxresearch.org.uk\/Blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5440","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.taxresearch.org.uk\/Blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.taxresearch.org.uk\/Blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.taxresearch.org.uk\/Blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.taxresearch.org.uk\/Blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5440"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.taxresearch.org.uk\/Blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5440\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.taxresearch.org.uk\/Blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5440"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.taxresearch.org.uk\/Blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5440"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.taxresearch.org.uk\/Blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5440"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}