bonus of more than a million pounds, after two regulators opened an investigation into his conduct in a whistle—blowing case. he'd attempted to find out who wrote a letter, raising concerns of a personal nature, about an unnamed senior colleague. here's our business editor simonjack. jes staley did not see this as whistle—blowing, you said this was a malicious smear against this person —— he said. trying to introduce their reputation, and he wanted to find out who the letter initially, the internal people are bart bles said, you should not be sticking your nose into this, —— the internal people at barclays. later he said it is not really a whistle blowing type of event, and said he could find out who wrote this letter and tried to involve us law enforcement officials. the regulators will take a dim view of this, because even if he thought this was a malicious smear, it is not your business, you have got to leave this to the

compliance people to do, and in the post—crisis environment, whistle—blowers are a highly protected species and they are seen as very valuable by regulators as a way of bad things coming to light. no matter what this was, it wasn't for him tojudge, and internally the bank has come down hard on him and they have adopted by nissan he will probably lose over £1 million —— they have adopt his bonus. and he has had a serious reprimand. the red laters will see this as a serious breach of what they can do to was a most —— the regulators. with me is arpita dutt, who's a partner at the law firm b.d.b.f which specialises in employment law and whistle—blowing cases. the point of being an whistle—blower is that you should have anonymity u nless is that you should have anonymity unless you want people to know who you are. that is right, that is what

they say in most of these cases, that whistle—blowers should be protected because they have to have confidence in the process. they have to know that when the process begins they should feel reassured that they are not going to be exposed and by not going to live in fear of retaliation and that is what anonymity provides the first step of reassurance towards. do most whistle—blowers want to keep that anonymity? some start by an anonymous disclosure by not all remain anonymous, and the next step for reassurance is the confidentiality of the process. whistle—blowers might become involved in the investigation but must be reassured of the comet and charity of that investigation. so they are not exposed. —— reassured they are not exposed. —— reassured the confidentiality. and that the law can keep the confidence on the pa rt law can keep the confidence on the part whistle—blowers, so if they do come forward, that they can do so

with impunity. the law has been beefed up especially in financial services, where there has been a requirement since march last year and since september, to appoint a whistle—blowers champion in financial services and that champion is an internal senior manager to make sure the independence and integrity of whistle—blowing processes and that again should be another reassurance passage to whistle—blowers. that they won't fear retaliation and that they shouldn't fear that, and that they shouldn't fear that, and that they should be encouraged to whistle—blowing. should be encouraged to whistle-blowing. it is also possible that people will come forward with claims and accusations to be malicious and not necessarily to blow the whistle on something that is genuinely happening? the financial conduct authority, the regulator, has said that there isn't any prohibition on banks weeding out or trying to weed out the militias

whistle—blower, the person with malicious intent. —— malicious. but thatis malicious intent. —— malicious. but that is harder than it seems, if a whistle—blower is anonymous, it will be difficult to weed out the malicious whistle—blower, the one with malicious intent, but also, how do you discern what is and isn't malicious intent? an ill founded disclosure which is raised in genuinely good faith may not be malicious. in your experience, do whistle—blowers come forward to blow the whistle on something which is going on? simply because they have seen something bad happening or because they have seen something bad happening and tried to do something about it and nothing has happened? it is often the latter in my experience, often they whistle—blower to managers and they might put something in writing, but nothing is done. they feel very strongly that the wrong they have uncovered is not being dealt with and not being remedied and investigated, and that is when they

formalise their whistle—blowing disclosure and that is when they raised their concern formerly. it is often after a process and often after a lot of thought. clearly that increasing the posada of the complaint —— the profile of the complaint —— the profile of the complaint would go over the head of the person they originally tried to make the complaint to? it should do and often that is the case, but it then becomes how wealthy individuals are trained in dealing with whistle—blowing disclosure is —— how well the individuals. as to what happens next. thanks forjoining us. more now on the meeting of foreign ministers from the g7 group of leading economic nations, who are in italy for two days of talks, with the syrian conflict dominating the agenda. the us secretary of state, rex tillerson, is leading calls for russia's president, vladimir putin, to distance himself from the assad regime, and find a way forward for a negotiated settlement

of the civil war. the foreign secretary, borisjohnson, will argue that syria has no future with bashar al assad as president. i've been speaking to the former uk ambassador to russia, sir andrew wood. i think it's very right that there should be some sort of unified message, including because it hasn't been entirely clear what the follow up been entirely clear what the follow up to the strike was to have been or how it fitted into a wider us and therefore western purpose, and that is important to remove doubt from the russian side. about that. it is also the case that the russians would have had a powerful shock which is why they are now responding by talking about retaliation and not sure what that is and why it is against international law in their eyes and things like that, while i suppose they gather their thoughts as to where they are going to go. interestingly say about mixed m essa 9 es interestingly say about mixed messages about going to moscow with the suggestion that there might be new sanctions. —— interesting you

say. is that because of conflicts of interest over sanctions to do with ukraine and further sanctions might not make a difference? that is possible. it has to be said, assad has used chemical weapons before, chlorine gas and barrel bombs, but there has been no talk of sanctions. is that because of the sanctions already in place with the ukraine situation? more cynically i suspect thatis situation? more cynically i suspect that is because nobody has really thought of that in that context. there are difficulties, of course, for everyone, assad has a measure of power. i think he is a problem for the russians, not just power. i think he is a problem for the russians, notjust because of his behaviour, but because of that. but because i don't believe have an alternative for the day talk about a settlement. it has got to be with assad or someone like assad, and for us that is an almost impossible future to contemplate. there is no

replacement for assad as far as the russians are concerned. they haven't found someone yet. they would like to find someone? quite possibly, i don't know. it depends on the mood of vladimir putin at the time. what is going on in the mind of vladimir putin at the moment? he has a president in the white house who is willing to use force. that was the first shock for him. he had supposed that president from would be rather different. —— president trump. it is not that long ago that the secretary of state rex tillerson was talking about having to recognise that assad was to stay, that was the invocation that the russians took. —— implication. that was the supposition that assad was under some sort of russian control. which presumably he's not. or alternatively, the russians are

indifferent to the use of chemical weapons when they had already promised former president barack obama that they would get rid of them all. so there is a lot of confusion there. my point was more that, if the russians wished to preserve their current set of aims, they are going to end up with assad, still, or someone from his grouping, and they can't easily switch sides u nless and they can't easily switch sides unless they are going to change their strategy completely. and there is no sign of their wishing to do that at present. sir andrew were, the former ambassador to russia —— andrew wood. in the last few minutes rex tillerson has said that the white house and america holds up the possibility of more strikes in syria. we know president trump ordered those tomahawk cruise missile attacks on black airbase in

syria —— that airbase. the airbase it is believed that those jets took off from and attacked the area in northern syria using chemical weapons. sean spicer the white house spokesperson has said he has made it clear that the united states holds open the possibility of more strikes. these comments coming as foreign ministers from the g—7 nations are meeting in italy to discuss a coordinated response to the conflict in syria. we can now hear from sean spicer. with respect to the reason that we took action, that was multifold, to stop the proliferation of chemical weapons, and when you see master weapons of destruction being used it should be a concern to every nation. —— massed weapons. the proliferation of those weapons. the proliferation of those weapons pose a grave threat to our

national security, and so number one we have got to stop that, and we have got to stop isis. with respect to the people of syria, by us taking action, and the escalating what is going on in syria, that is the greatest thing you can do to support those people. the escalating the conflict containing isis is the greatest aspect of humanitarian relief that we can provide first and foremost. secondly creating areas in which we can work with allies including russia and committing to making sure that there are places that are free from violence and there are places for people to gather safely, because i think eve ryo ne gather safely, because i think everyone would agree that the last thing people want to do there is leave, they want to stay there and be in syria and they want to have a safe place to remain with their families and not be separated. our number one priority is to defeat isis but we are also from a humanitarian standpoint, making sure

that we create an environment that provides a safe place for them to ultimately remain. russia in particular, look, if you look at the countries that with us, it speaks pretty loudly, the number of countries that have stood shoulder to shoulder with this president, and russia on the other had stands with syria and north korea and iran. when you contrast the groups of countries, sets, it is clear that we are on the right side of this issue. are we going to commit troops? no, what it means... that is the white house spokesperson. sean spicer. and now we have the weather forecast. we have a fine end to most of the evening for everyone, but we have a chilly night. the north—west

highlands and the hebrides and orkney and shetland, outbreaks of rain developing widely. mainly on the western side of the hills. a few spots of rain elsewhere, temperatures dropping to around two degrees. parts of rural wales, midlands and southern england could be around those values as we start tomorrow, and much of england and wales will be dry tomorrow. bright and sunny spells and northern ireland and south—eastern scotland. the western side of the highlands across scotland, where we have rain on and off to the day, and a bit of a breeze, making it feel cool. temperatures drop through the rest of the week, and it will be cooler by day and by night, with a chance of some sunshine and showers to take us into easter weekend, but also a lot of dry weather. hello and welcome to 100 days. after the tomahawks, now what? america's policy

on syria is confusing. the monday after the bombing, there's no evidence of further us engagement. so, as foreign ministers from western powers huddle at the g7 talks in italy, it's not clear the american attack has changed their thinking. the us supreme court has a new justice. neil gorsuch is sworn in at the white house and now could help shape american law for decades to come. iam humbled. to those much is given, much will be expected. the balance of power between the populists and the realists appears to be shifting. the funeral service for keith palmer, the police constable stabbed to death in the westminster terror attack. thousands of officers lined the route of the funeral cortege