Goodwin shaming tawdry: Darling

• Former RBS chief executive Fred Goodwin has been stripped of his knighthood

Alistair Darling has criticised the "tawdry" treatment meted out to Fred Goodwin after the banker was humiliatingly stripped of his knighthood.

The former chancellor voiced distaste at the way Mr Goodwin had been singled out by the Government, while other senior figures escaped punishment.
The award was "cancelled and annulled" by the Queen on Tuesday after a key committee found the ex-Royal Bank of Scotland (RBS) boss had brought the honours system into "disrepute".
Politicians from across parties hailed the move, which brackets him with notorious figures such as Soviet spy Anthony Blunt and Zimbabwe's Robert Mugabe.
Prime Minister David Cameron said it was the "right decision", while Chancellor George Osborne insisted Mr Goodwin represented "everything that went wrong in the British economy over the last decade".
Labour leader Ed Miliband said the punishment was "only the start of the change we need" in boardrooms, but some Tory MPs expressed concern about the extent of political influence on the City.
Writing in The Times, Mr Darling, who as chancellor led negotiations over the RBS bailout, insisted: "There is something tawdry about the Government directing its fire at Fred Goodwin alone; if it's right to annul his knighthood, what about the honours of others who were involved in RBS and HBoS?"
Mr Goodwin received his knighthood for services to banking under the Labour government, before guiding RBS to the brink of collapse in 2008.
Honours are usually only removed from individuals who have been convicted and jailed, but the Cabinet Office said the scale of the RBS disaster - necessitating a £45 billion bailout from the taxpayer - made the case "exceptional".
The Forfeiture Committee, made up of senior civil servants, met last week to consider the issue. Its recommendation to strip Mr Goodwin of the honour was conveyed to the Queen by the Prime Minister.