Once again the bonuses paid to bankers have made the headlines, this time with the chancellor's speech to the Labour party conference. Pay in the financial sector has always been an emotive issue, and now it is a political issue as well, but beyond the public pronouncements much work has already been done to create a significantly better regime here in the UK.

Although pay is one of the hot-button issues this party conference season, the real reasons for the credit crunch are widely understood among the politicians. International standards weren't resilient enough, complex products were incorrectly rated, regulators both here and elsewhere did not catch the problems and economies were grown on debt using cheap credit from the east. We would not deny that bonuses need to be addressed, but we would make a plea that the public be offered a wider perspective on how the credit crunch happened and how we can best ensure it does not happen again.

As an industry, we agree that change must be made. In fact a great deal of change has taken place already, and in the UK that includes the regulation of bank pay structures.

Our Financial Services Authority has already introduced regulation on pay, which is more than any other country has done. And it has won commitments from the major UK banks that no bonuses will be paid in the coming year unless the bonus structure has been agreed with the regulator. This regulation includes important things like linking pay to long-term performance, meaning that staff only get rewarded if the right job is done.

We agree that remuneration and bonuses need to be tied to the long-term success of the business and not for rewarding foolhardy risk-taking or flash-in-the-pan results. We do not agree that this means imposing an arbitrary ceiling on bonuses. The UK industry needs the flexibility to attract, reward and retain the best talent there is. Banking is after all a global business and the brightest can – and will – move to where the best deals are found.

It is a pity that bankers' remuneration has become such a political dog-whistle issue because if the UK is serious about remaining at the forefront of the world's financial services industry, we need to work together to ensure pay deals reflect the need to reward success. We do not want to create holes through which talent can drain away to our competitors.

Other countries want what we have got. It is important to remember that although bank-bashing may win politicians votes, it will not keep Britain its jobs.