New figures show HSBC’s top earner raked in £8.4 million, while 180 UK staff pocketed bonuses averaging £600,000, and HSBC paid just £236 million in UK corporation tax last year – despite doubling its profits to £11.8billion.
The data about the earnings of ‘council fat cats’ need to be put in context; we cannot address public sector pay without addressing private sector pay.
So much remains in doubt on bonuses. But what we know for sure is that the Treasury’s entire bank levy revenue estimates between 2011-2014 were made when bonus payments were anticipated to be higher than they had been in 2008. And the idea that the banks should be offered another sop when they should be paying for the mess they created simply demonstrates where this conservative coalition’s priorities lie.
Today is the official launch of an independent inquiry into high pay. The aptly named High Pay Commission has been established by Compass and is supported by the Joseph Rowntree Charitable Trust. To mark the launch the commission conducted private polling with YouGov which had some remarkable results.
Andy Coulson’s salary has escaped scrutiny in today’s list of top civil service pay. But his reported £475,000 salary is likely to make headlines next year.
37 council chief executives in England received average payoffs of more than £250,000 each in the 33 months to last September, the Audit Commission has found.
