The decision to pay former finance minister Gerrit Zalm a whopping €750,000 a year for merging Fortis and ABN Amro into one state-owned bank has come in for a lot of stick.

At a time when bank chiefs are under fire for their fat cat salaries it is an odd signal to send out to the private sector.
And there has been the predictable bleating about why he is being paid so much more than the prime minister.
But perhaps the most telling part of Zalm’s package is the so-called bonus – €100,000 for every €1bn profit made when the new bank is sold off. Not that it is unlimited – the bonus has a ceiling of half his annual salary or €375,000.
So to reach his maximum bonus, Zalm needs to make sure the new bank sale makes at least €3.75bn profit. Which should not be much of a challenge for anyone.
All that aside, Zalm might be seen as ‘heavyweight’ but what exactly are his qualifications for the job?
He was a very well-regarded finance minister because of the way he kept within his own spending limits and, of course, he has excellent government contacts.
But apart from the few months he spent at DSB, Zalm does not have much in the way of private sector or even banking experience.
Fortis and ABN Amro may be state-owned, but they are not yet staffed by civil servants.