The leaders of Europe’s three largest nations, Britain, France and Germany, issued a joint call on Thursday for “binding rules” to rein in bankers’ bonuses as the finance ministers of the G20 group of nations prepared to meet in London this weekend.

A joint letter from the UK’s Gordon Brown, Germany’s Angela Merkel and France’s Nicolas Sarkozy signalled that Europe is uniting behind specific proposals to link the size of bonuses to fixed pay and to bank performance over long periods. The three leaders also came out in favour of deferring awards and clawbacks in case of negative outcomes.