Former deputy prime minister John Prescott has launched an online campaign on social networking site Facebook to stop failing banks from awarding bonuses to employees.

In a rallying speech to Labour activists in Manchester, he said: “We are all shareholders now and the shareholders demand you give up the bonus.

“President [Barack] Obama has been very successful in creating an online army to support his fiscal stimulus package through Congress – and we should use that people power here.

“We must utilise these same online grassroots tactics to force these greedy and indifferent banks, that the taxpayer bailed out, to give up their bonuses.”

The Prescott campaign comes as the controversy over bank bonuses reaches fever point in Westminster – spurred on by action across the Atlantic.

Chancellor Alistair Darling urged the public to draw a distinction between those responsible for the crisis and those lower down the food chain.

“I have spoken to the chief executive of RBS and I have made it clear, and he agrees, that no one associated with these large losses should be allowed to walk away with large cash bonuses,” Mr Darling said.

“Obviously, there are contractual problems with some staff. Your average teller… is not terribly well paid and I don’t think anyone would quarrel with making sure they are properly rewarded.

“As RBS has said, they want to make sure they cut these payments to the absolute minimum. They have to understand these banks would not be here but for taxpayers, therefore they have to show the degree of restraint people would expect.”

For his part, Mr Prescott said he was trying to use social networking sites to harness the public’s anger at what he called “raw capitalism”.