[Shaun]

Royal Bank of Scotland chief executive Stephen Hester will not take his near-£1m bonus, the BBC has learned.

Business editor Robert Peston says Mr Hester will not now accept the £963,000 shares-only payment offered to him.

He succumbed to "enormous political and media pressure" despite RBS's board urging him to fight, Peston added.

Chancellor George Osborne said it was a "sensible and welcome" decision that let Mr Hester focus on getting back billions of pounds for the taxpayer.

Earlier, Labour said it would force a vote on the issue after PM David Cameron refused to block the bonus from the mostly publicly owned bank.

Robert Peston said the board had urged Mr Hester to fight because it felt he had earned the bonus for the way he had made RBS a less risky organisation.

Reacting to Mr Hester's decision, Labour MP Chris Bryant said it was just one example of a wider problem.

"If there had been a debate in Parliament, it would have been phenomenally difficult for him to have taken that money," he said.

"And it may well be now that there needs to be a debate in Parliament, not about his bonus, but about the whole culture of bonus and remuneration in financial services."

Former Liberal Democrat Treasury spokesman Lord Oakeshott said it was "better late than never".

"I'm glad that eventually Stephen Hester has seen sense and seen the outrage of most people in this country and Lib Dems who have been complaining bitterly about this for weeks," he said.

"I'm very sorry that David Cameron and George Osborne didn't see that, and have been defending the indefensible right up to today."

Mr Hester was appointed chief executive at the end of 2008 to replace Sir Fred Goodwin, after the bank had to be bailed out by the government, which now owns 82% of it.

Earlier, Cabinet minister Iain Duncan Smith told BBC One's Andrew Marr Show there would have been "chaos" if the government had overruled RBS over the bonus.

He said "nobody would be happier than the government" if Mr Hester decided not to take it, but it was "up to him".

scruples...in banking...