NatWest poised to cancel bulk of Rose’s potential £10m payoff
NatWest Group is to scrap the bulk of a possible £10m-plus payout to Dame Alison Rose, its former chief executive, as it tries to draw a line under the debanking row sparked by the closure of Nigel Farage’s Coutts accounts.
Sky News has learnt that the board of NatWest, which is just under 40% owned by British taxpayers, has decided not to pay most of the discretionary elements of Dame Alison’s pay package.
A source close to the bank said the NatWest board’s decision was expected to be announced to the London Stock Exchange on Friday.
While the precise numbers were unclear on Thursday evening, it had been expected that NatWest would adopt a hard line towards its former chief, who stepped down in late July after admitting that she discussed the former UKIP leader’s banking arrangements with a BBC journalist.
The NatWest board’s decision means that Dame Alison will forfeit millions of pounds in unvested share awards, although she is expected to receive a seven-figure sum in the form of her basic salary and fixed share allowance.
Dame Alison’s contract, which incorporated a 12-month notice period, stipulated that she would receive an annual salary of £1.16m, with a further sum of the same amount in deferred share awards.
Her legal fees are also expected to be paid by the bank.
Dame Alison had accrued unvested share awards worth roughly £5m, most of which had been awarded since she became chief executive in 2019.
This week, the Information Commissioner’s Office was forced to make a grovelling apology to Dame Alison after it claimed she had broken privacy laws – an apology which prompted a furious response from Mr Farage.
It emerged following a subject access request by Mr Farage that NatWest employees had belittled the broadcaster and former politician, making a stream of pejorative comments about his views and finances.
Read more:
Nigel Farage and NatWest: A timeline of what happened
Key points from Coutts’ dossier on Farage
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‘The report is an utter whitewash’
Last month, the bank apologised to Mr Farage, acknowledging that it had been guilty of “serious failings” in the way it had treated him.
The decision to “debank” Mr Farage sparked a firestorm in Westminster and forced the City watchdog into an urgent review of the practice across Britain’s banking sector.
According to a public filing by NatWest in August, Dame Alison has been receiving her annual £2.4m package comprising base salary, pension contribution and a share-based fixed-pay allowance since her departure at the end of July.
She was also eligible to be considered for a pro-rata portion of the £2.9m annual bonus and long-term share awards that made up the remainder of her total maximum pay package of £5.3m.
In addition, she held roughly 2.5 million unvested shares in NatWest, which at Thursday’s closing share price of 200.8p were worth in the region of £5m.
That amounted to a theoretical total of more than £10m, although the fact that Dame Alison left midway through 2023 means she would in any case only have been eligible for just over half of the £2.9m in annual variable pay.
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‘It’s about values’: PM on Farage row
The Treasury was expecting to be consulted on the terms of her exit package ahead of an announcement, although it was unclear on Thursday evening whether it had given its consent.
Dame Alison left the bank by mutual consent – where she had been widely regarded to be doing an effective rebuilding job 15 years after its £45.5bn taxpayer bailout – after acknowledging that she had inaccurately briefed a BBC journalist about the reasons for closing Mr Farage’s accounts.
The report, which the broadcaster was forced to amend, suggested that the former UKIP leader did not meet its commercial criteria.
It subsequently emerged that his political views had been instrumental in the decision.
Dame Alison has been replaced on an interim basis by Paul Thwaite, formerly the head of its commercial business.
Dame Alison, the first woman to run one of Britain’s big four London-listed banks, had initially sought to draw a line under the row with Mr Farage by apologising to him, and then by foregoing her bonus for this year.
Within hours, however, signals from Downing Street that it had lost confidence in her leadership prompted the bank to convene an emergency board meeting to rubber-stamp her departure.
NatWest, the Treasury and a spokesman for Dame Alison all declined to comment.
A man has been jailed for life for murdering his son’s girlfriend after she returned home from the school run.
Officers from Dyfed-Powys Police were called to an address on Bigyn Road in Llanelli, Carmarthenshire, on 5 July last year.
Sophie Evans, 30, had sustained 72 separate injuries on the outside of the body, “all but three of them new injuries”.
Richard Jones, who is now 50, believed he was “being taken advantage of financially” by Ms Evans and his son, with whom she was in a relationship.
While the purpose of Jones’s visit was “purely normal”, he confronted her on that morning about his suspicions and Ms Evans’s reaction was such that Jones “lost [his] temper”.
He subjected Ms Evans to “gross violence” before ultimately strangling her and leaving the property to run errands, including ordering a new bank card and buying pastries from a bakery.
Richard Jones. Pic: Dyfed-Powys Police
‘Last time on their school run’
During sentencing on Monday, the defendant kept his head bowed for most of the hearing.
He will have to serve at least 20 years behind bars before he can be considered for release by the parole board.
Swansea Crown Court heard Ms Evans was the mother of two young children.
Passing his sentence, Judge Geraint Walters said Ms Evans “had just taken her two children for the last time on their school run” prior to the attack.
“She wasn’t to know that when she parted company with them that morning,” he added.
The court heard the Jones believed he was being defrauded by Ms Evans and his son.
“There is clear evidence, that in the days leading up to this, that you had begun harbouring thoughts that Sophie Evans and your own son were in fact financially scamming you,” he said.
“What precisely brought about that view is difficult to determine.”
Judge Walters said Jones “lost [his] temper when [he] didn’t get the answer that [he] thought [he] deserved”.
He added that, having lost his temper, the defendant “subjected [Ms Evans] to gross violence over a period of time, before you ultimately extinguished her life by strangulation”.
The court was told in evidence that at the time of the attack, Ms Evans was wearing only a bath towel.
‘The rock of our family’
In a victim personal statement, Ms Evans’s sister Kerry Quinlan told the court she was “the rock of our family”.
She said Ms Evans was taken from them in a “senseless and cruel act”.
“Words cannot express fully how much of a loss this has been to her children,” she added.
“When they cry themselves to sleep wanting their mum, she isn’t there and never will be.”
Ms Quinlan added that Jones had “taken everything from us, all in the most despicable way possible”.
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Ms Evans’s partner at the time, and the defendant’s son, Jamie Davies, said in a victim personal statement, read on his behalf, that they had both “trusted” Jones, and that Ms Evans had even been planning the defendant’s 50th birthday.
“The thought of having to live my life without Sophie causes me extreme pain and heartache,” he added.
Prosecuting, Michael Jones KC said the offence was aggravated by the defendant’s previous convictions and the fact Ms Evans was murdered in her home.
In mitigation, David Elias KC said there was a “lack of premeditation”.
UK
Third man charged with murder over house fire in Bradford that killed mother and her three children
The family of pop star Liam Payne has criticised the media for causing “indescribable, lasting damage” in the wake of his death.
The singer, 31, died in October last year, after falling from a hotel balcony in Argentina.
He was honoured with a video montage, played at Saturday night’s BRIT awards, celebrating his legacy – with clips including his time on X-Factor and during his time with One Direction. The band won seven BRIT awards before they split in 2016.
In a statement, released to the media after the tribute was played, his family called the death an “unspeakable tragedy”.
The family also criticised the “attention and speculation” in the press that caused “indescribable, lasting damage on the family, particularly on Liam’s son, who is trying to process emotions which no seven-year-old should have to experience”.
It said the family accepted the Court of Appeal’s decision to drop all charges in relation to Payne’s death.
One Direction pictured at the 2014 Brit Awards – the band won seven gongs during their time together. Pic: PA
One Direction, pictured in 2011. Pic: AP
Charges were dropped against three defendants: Payne’s friend Roger Nores, who had accompanied him during his trip to Buenos Aires; Gilda Martin, the manager of the Casa Sur Palermo Hotel where Payne died; and Esteban Grassi, the hotel’s main receptionist.
Two others are still facing prosecution for allegedly supplying Payne with drugs. Supplying drugs in Argentina carries a sentence of up to 15 years in prison.
Toxicology tests revealed that before his death, he had traces of alcohol, cocaine, and a prescription antidepressant in his body. A postmortem ruled his cause of death as “polytrauma” from multiple injuries and internal and external bleeding.
‘Beautiful’ Brits tribute
After the video aired, Payne’s former band member Louis Tomlinson thanked the BRIT Awards and said: “Beautiful tribute. Miss you always, brother x.”
Awards host Jack Whitehall introduced the tribute to the singer and said: “He achieved so much in the short time that he was on this earth, and was not only a supremely gifted musician but an incredibly kind soul who touched the lives of everyone he came into contact with.
Themed tributes for singer Liam Payne were seen outside St. Mary’s Church on the day of his funeral.
Pic: Reuters
Fans sing One Direction around a candle-lit tribute for Liam Payne
“We have so many amazing memories with Liam here at The BRITs. So, tonight we celebrate his legacy and look back and remember, the remarkable Liam Payne.”
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