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Alistair Darling has hit out at "kamikaze" bankers and promised action to stop them damaging the British economy again.

He has already indicated next week's White Paper on banking reform will include greater powers for the Bank of England and Financial Services Authority (FSA).

Speaking on Sky News, the Chancellor said the culture of banking must be changed so bankers are motivated to build up their institutions in the long term rather than chasing short-term gains.

He told Sunday Live: "The FSA is getting new powers to make sure people are incentivised to build the banks up over the long term.

"The long term is so important. We have to get our money back from RBS and the Lloyds Banking Group.

"We have to make sure we get credit going.

"That means we have to engender a long-term attitude and culture that was simply missing in too many banks in the past."

Regulators would be able to ask "searching questions" and be "ready and able to deal with failures when they arise", he wrote in an article for the News Of The World.

Mr Darling said: "We need to learn lessons from the financial crisis in which banks behaved in a kamikaze manner and the regulatory system failed.

"Far too many people in boardrooms did not know, nor understand what was happening in their institutions.

"We know now that no authority in the world understood the true risks to the system or the likely consequences. That needs to change.

"I want a new banking system we can all rely on and which will be the foundation of our new prosperity."

The proposed reforms would "deliver tougher regulation and more rigorous monitoring".

The Bank of England is expected to be given a central role in preventing future booms turning into bubbles and assessing risks to the system and individual banks.

City watchdog the FSA will be told to do more to curb bonuses that reward short-term profits.