Osborne defends ‘rewards for success’

George Osborne’s speech to the Federation of Small Businesses tonight tries to offer some reassurance that the coalition isn’t caving into the anti-business zeitgeist. Referring to the recent rows over executive pay, he deplores rewards for failure before saying ‘a strong, free market economy must be built on rewards for success. There are those who are trying to create an anti-business culture in Britain – and we have to stop them.’

How reassuring business leaders will find this remains to be seen. As Robert Peston reported yesterday there’s a lot of grumbling from them about the government’s handling of the Hester bonus and other matters. (To be fair to Osborne, he was prepared to defend the Hester bonus) But there needs to be a sense of political realism here as well. The mistake, one made by both the government and RBS, was to imagine that RBS could be run as a commercial bank within the public sector for a prolonged period.