Bankers’ Bonuses

Debate between Andrew Griffith and Jon Trickett

Tuesday 8th November 2022 Westminster Hall

[The Economic Secretary to the Treasury (Andrew Griffith)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mrs Cummins, and I congratulate the hon. Member for Hemsworth (Jon Trickett) on securing the debate. I accept that he is sincere in bringing forward his concern and that of his constituents, but we on this side of the House believe that he is sadly wrong.

In responding for the Government, I am grateful for the opportunity to lift the lid on what is an important but often misrepresented issue. Let me be unequivocal from the outset that the Government are unapologetic about our commitment to the financial services industry, which stretches across the whole of this great nation. If the hon. Gentleman cares to talk to his Front-Bench colleagues, he will find that the policy of both Front-Bench teams is to support the sector in order to help grow our economy and create the prosperity from which we all benefit.

[Jon Trickett]

Will the Minister give way?

[Andrew Griffith]

I will happily do so. Perhaps we will hear more about the policy of those on the Opposition Front Bench.

[Jon Trickett]

Does the Minister accept that I am not speaking on behalf of my Front-Bench colleagues? I am speaking about the views of my constituents and others across the country, and in the interests of what I believe the country should be doing. The Government are clearly wrong, whatever those on the two Front Benches are proposing.

[Andrew Griffith]

It is always a pleasure to hear a Member of this House speak on behalf of their constituents, which is indeed what we are here to do. I stand corrected by the hon. Gentleman: this debate is not about the policy of Opposition Front Benchers. I just thought it was worth setting that in context, because where there is consensus, we should build on it. I understand his views, but the scale of the sector’s contribution to the United Kingdom is truly massive.

Financial and related professional services, and all those that are engaged in the support functions, make up 12% of the UK’s gross value added—12% of the economy. That is millions of jobs, and not just in the City. Indeed, I actively push back against the idea that I am the City Minister, because that is not the case. The financial sector has to build bridges and reach into every household across the country. To that point, the hon. Gentleman is probably aware from talking to his constituents that there are 145,000 jobs in the financial sector and related industries in Yorkshire and the Humber, and long may that continue. Those are the sorts of high-quality, high-skilled jobs that I am sure he seeks for his constituents, for our generation and for generations to come.

The sector produces prodigious amounts of tax revenues—billions of pounds—without which our public services would be in peril. Because of the financial services sector, I can look our hospitals, schools, police, fire services and all of our brilliant, fabulous public servants in the eye. The hon. Gentleman might tell us that they do not get enough revenues, but one of the ways in which we can continue to make sure that they are sustainably well financed is on the back of the very bankers he decries, and my mission is to continue to grow this wonderful sector.

I return to the subject of the debate: the bonus cap. Although many people are confused about what the bonus cap is, I know that the hon. Gentleman has followed this topic and is not confused. It is not a cap on bonus pay. If he would like to introduce such a measure, Parliament offers many wonderful opportunities for him to do so, including ten-minute rule Bills and Backbench Business debates. If he would like to propose a cap on bonuses, I am sure that the House would be keen to hear more about how such a cap would work.

I think the hon. Gentleman knows that what we are talking about is not a cap on bonuses whereby fixed pay is inflated and bankers are paid the egregious amounts that he talks about. This did no such thing. It was simply about the composition of pay and how much of it is geared to performance versus a mere entitlement or fact of contractual law. It has never been a cap. The EU directive that the hon. Gentleman talked about relates to the ratio of fixed pay to bonuses. At no point has there been a cap. To be in favour of the status quo is actually to be in favour of higher basic salaries for bankers. Perhaps we should have renamed this debate, “The debate about higher basic salaries for bankers.” We may have got more bankers to come and watch, but I am not sure how many hon. Members would have clamoured to support a debate about higher basic pay for bankers. This is a really important point. The hon. Gentleman himself raised the fact that since this so-called cap was introduced, we have actually seen an increase in pay. If it was a cap, by its own definition it has failed.

The consequence of all this is that by removing restrictions, more of bankers’ pay can be performance-based. If they do not perform, perhaps their salaries will go down and perhaps the hon. Member’s objectives would be achieved by the very measure the Government have advocated. We would be removing the insistence on higher fixed pay, and more of it would be based on performance. If they do not perform or grow the economy, and if they do not contribute the near 50% share that the bankers will typically be paying in tax to our nation, then their salaries will go down. I would offer that to the hon. Gentleman as a reframing of how he thinks about this.

This is a common remuneration structure, not just in this sector but elsewhere in the economy. It is how many industries align performance and incentives in a sensible way. I have heard the argument that removing what we have now established as a so-called bonus cap will see a return to the bad behaviour and perverse incentives that led to the global financial crisis. The hon. Gentleman was there at the heart of that in No. 10, and I can understand that experience, but things have moved on—not just in respect of this cap, but the fourth European directive.

At that point there was no broader remuneration framework for bankers. They could get their entire variable pay on the day it was awarded. There was no element of deferral or additional regulatory requirements, such as those imposed by the Prudential Regulation Authority and the Financial Conduct Authority, to require a significant proportion of variable remuneration to be deferred for a number of years. In those years, firms are able to revisit performance and material events or misconduct and then take account of those within the remuneration framework. Since the hon. Gentleman’s service in No. 10, we have seen the introduction of the senior managers regime, which has even greater accountability.

The point is that the regulatory structures have evolved. They were right to evolve in the aftermath of the global financial crisis, but the reforms that work do not include this arbitrary and variable remuneration ratio.

--- Later in debate ---

[Jon Trickett]

The Minister will have heard me talking about a person in the City being remunerated £68 million in a single year. Of that, £200,000 was the basic pay, and the rest was bonus. I think the Minister is resting his case on the expansion of basic salaries, but that is not the case for that person. It would take the average person in my constituency 2,260 years on an average salary to achieve what that person achieved in a year. Is that possibly morally justifiable?

[Andrew Griffith]

The hon. Gentleman needs to make peace with the benefits of a capitalist, free-enterprise, private, risk-taking economy. I understand that that is a certain distance for the hon. Gentleman to travel. Perhaps we do not have enough time this afternoon for the hon. Gentleman to travel all that distance. By his own admission, he chose the most extreme of the most extreme cases. I celebrate, because in that example, his, mine and your constituents, Mrs Cummins, would be better off to the tune of £34 million, from that single, most productive of financial services employees in that year putting that money back into the Exchequer. I sincerely hope that is absolutely the case, because the Government have made a great endeavour to collect all the tax revenues owed.

I will shortly conclude, but earlier the hon. Gentleman seemed to decry the fact that seven out of 10 of the most highly paid bankers in Europe were based in London in the United Kingdom. I think the very opposite. The Government’s view is that, if not seven, it should be eight, and that we should seek to obtain those revenues and grow our economy, reinvesting in the productive and public services.

At the beginning, the hon. Gentleman made great play that this was one of the few surviving measures of the mini-Budget, the then growth plan. I cannot leave that lying on file, because the biggest single measure, which all our constituents benefit from right now, as the nights grow colder and the temperatures plummet, was the £60 million—

[Jon Trickett]

Billion—let me help the Minister.

[Andrew Griffith]

Sixty billion pounds—a little more than bankers’ pay. That is now flowing into individuals’ heating, fuel and energy bills, protecting every one of our constituents, up and down the United Kingdom. This was not the sole surviving measure that the hon. Gentleman talked about. This was a sensible measure, part of taking an inherited European rulebook that never fitted the fact pattern of the United Kingdom. That is why the Bank of England and the Liberal Democrat part of the coalition all made great protestations at the time that the fourth European capital requirements directive was introduced, because it did not fit the unique fact pattern of the United Kingdom.

Let me conclude. I pay tribute to the hon. Gentleman for bringing these matters to the House. It is absolutely right that we talk about this and understand how we are going to drive our economy forward in the fairest possible way. The City, I hasten to remind him, has a significant duty to society, and must be connected to every part of the United Kingdom, even our wonderful Administration north of the border. The Government’s position is that the measure is the right one. The hon. Gentleman asked whether the Government stood by that. It is the case, because we want a productive economy and people to be paid what they earn, but no more than is warranted. That is why we continue to stand by the measure.

Question put and agreed to.