THE head of taxpayer-owned Royal Bank of Scotland (RBC) has said he can’t guarantee that financial scandals will not happen again under his watch.

One thing Ross McEwan could guarantee though is that another financial crash is coming, but banks and regulators would be more prepared this time.

He told the Press Association: “The 2008 crisis was enormous, and it was a build-up of probably a decade plus of debts being built up, and bank acquisitions that were poorly funded, and a whole raft of issues.

“But I think of course there will be another financial stress in some point in time - be it a crisis or a recession of sorts.”

McEwan said banks are now better protected against a full-blown crisis, after being forced by regulators to build up capital cushions to levels that are up to three to four times what they were before the 2008 crash.

In addition, liquidity levels - which refer to how quickly assets can be bought and sold - are in “much better shape”.

He said: “It's not going to be such an impact on the banks and its customers again.

“But will it happen again? You can pretty well guarantee it, but what shape or form it comes in, I couldn't guess.”

McEwan stressed that efforts to “rethink the business” and take customers into consideration in “every change we make” had reduced the chance that RBS will be hit with further conduct and litigation issues.

However, he stopped short of promising that RBS would have a clean record during his tenure.

“Can I say this will never happen again? I'm sorry, I can't,” he said.

RBS has been dogged by several scandals since the 2008 crisis, including the mis-selling of payment protection insurance (PPI), mortgage-backed securities and the mistreatment of small businesses.

“We still employ 70,000 people, we still have a very large balance sheet and business and it's much simpler. It's not a simple bank like many others, but I think we've put things in place now that we minimise any of those issues.”

The issue raises concerns over the chief executive's handle on potential scandals which could see senior staff held responsible for any misconduct under the new Senior Managers and Certification Regime (SMCR).

“I think there is a much lesser chance that we will have any of those big issues that we've dealt with like PPI, which is an industry issue, and GRG (Global Restructuring Group). We didn't manage our customers at a time when they needed to be looked after and managed,” he admitted.

“We did a very bad job.

“But today our organisation is very focused on the customer and we did put things in place and had the conversations before we made those changes, and so I think there's a much lesser chance.”

The RBS chief was speaking around the 10-year anniversary of the bank’s £45 billion Government bailout, contributing to a financial crisis which still haunts the UK financial sector a decade on.

RBS is still 62% owned by the taxpayer.

A legal firm has warned that around 14,000 businesses may not be able to claim for losses sustained through their treatment by GRG with the closure of the complaints scheme.

RBS has received more than 1650 complaints from a potential customer base of 16,000 and the deadline for the complaints scheme is next week.

Daniel Fallows, director of Seneca Banking Consultants, which specialises in GRG cases, said: “We are urging businesses to lodge their complaints as soon as possible to ensure they do not miss the deadline if October 22, 2018.”