RBS getting its tax back - with interest

Sir Fred Goodwin must wish he could swallow his words. The former chief executive of Royal Bank of Scotland once flagged up the taxes the bank paid as a major part of its contribution to society.

But now the £20 billion bill the taxpayer faces for bailing out the bank is greater than the total in corporate taxes the lender paid under his watch. RBS paid £16 billion in corporate taxes from 1998 to 2007.

"The benefits of our success stretch far outside the company. We continue to be the largest corporate tax payer in the UK," Goodwin wrote in 2006 in the bank's corporate responsibility report.

Goodwin, ousted in November, added that the money helped in "supporting the Government in the provision of public services such as schools, hospitals and state pensions". In the decade he was in charge, RBS expanded its balance sheet more than 20 times to £1.73 trillion.