Passengers arriving at Edinburgh Airport notice few signs of recession - apart from a long line of taxis, whose drivers complain that business travellers are much more likely to take a bus into the city centre.

But the carpark across from the terminal no longer has “fast track” spaces for executives of Royal Bank of Scotland, the pride of the capital's financial services sector until it was forced during October's banking meltdown to sell most of its shares to the government. RBS has also stopped using the private jet in which Sir Fred Goodwin, former chief executive, visited his international empire.