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Protest's outside, apology's inside.

"And we are extremely sorry."

The four former bosses of Britain's two biggest troubled banks, the Royal Bank of Scotland and HBOS, gave a little of what the members of parliament wanted to hear.

"We are profoundly, and I think I would say unreservedly, sorry at the time of events."

"There is a profound and unqualified apology for all of the distress that has been caused."

These were far cries from mere culpas, none of the four said it was their fault.

But on the day that RBS confirmed that another 2,000 job cuts, the former head, nickname Fred the Shred, for his cause cutting after 140 billion dollars worth of mergers continues to be the focus of a lot of shareholder and union anger.

"It's just too simple if you want to blame it all on me, you want to blame it all on me and close the book, that will get the job done very quickly, but it does not go anywhere close to this, because all of this."

The UK government has spent tens of billions of dollars buying stakes in these banks. The taxpayer now owns 43% of HBOS, which is merged with Lloyds TSB and 68% of RBS. The RBS board was criticised for its takeover of Dutch bank ABN AMRO in 2007, just as the Credit Crunch to acold.

"At that time, it seemed like a good thing to do, I bought a lot of shares on the day it happened and I thought it was a good thing to do."

Critics say ABN AMRO was a deal too far.

"You are still defending, the great position of the bank on the 16th September, and we are listening here, thinking what I gonna meet it three weeks later, the government has to put in 20 billion pounds to keep that bank going."

The bonus culture also came under scrutiny.

"There is no doubt that the bonus systems in many banks around the world have been proven to be wrong in the last 24 months."

The four men who have explained themselves before parliament on Tuesday all lost their jobs during the crisis. On Wednesday afternoon, it's the turn of those who now run Britain's banks.

Jim Boulden, cnn, London.

GLOSSARY

1.       the Royal Bank of Scotland（= RBS）             苏格兰皇家银行    

2.       HBOS                       苏格兰哈里法克斯银行（Halifax and Bank of Scotland，HBOS）      

3.       unreservedly                adv.不客气地, 率直地     

4.       far cry                       n.长距离 很远的距离

5.       culpa                        n.[律]疏忽, 罪

6.       merger                      n.合并, 归并

7.       close the book               结帐       

8.       stakes                       股份

9.       Lloyds TSB                 英国劳埃德银行     

10.    ABN AMRO                  荷兰银行    

11.    acold                        adj.寒冷的

12.    bonus system             奖金制度,分红制,职工奖金制度