Hubris, crisis and scandal: how the NatWest ‘soap opera’ unfolded

The RBS boss Fred Goodwin in April 2008. His lavish spending and big pension package sparked a public backlash after the rescue. Photograph: David Moir/Reuters

Hours before the government fired the starting gun on what became a £45bn bailout of Royal Bank of Scotland (RBS) in October 2008, Whitehall was in chaos. Dozens of City bankers, drafted in to support the chancellor, Alistair Darling, were camped along the Treasury building’s winding corridors, juggling laptops and mobile phones as they worked to keep the UK’s financial system afloat.

“It looked a little bit like an under-stress NHS hospital,” Charles Randell, the government’s former legal adviser, recalls.