Bosses pay rises up to six times faster than employees

A survey of top company bosses pay has revealed that salaries have increased by 18% in the last year.

The survey of 1,000 top directors conducted by Income Data Services showed that around half had incomes in excess of £1 million and a few received remuneration packages put at £5 million a year.

FTSE-100 companies top executives are for the first time looking forward to remuneration packages in excess of £2 million.

The top 350 companies had average executive pay rises of 18%. Rises in top boardroom packages over the last few years mean that more top company executives are earning more money than ever before, despite average annual wage settlements running at between 3 and 3.5%.

Commenting on the report from Incomes Data Services on executive pay, TUC General Secretary Brendan Barber has urged a curb on executive pay "excesses".

Mr Barber said: "The sky high increases of top executive pay show no sign of slowing. Whilst ordinary workers are happy to accept pay rises in the region of 3.5 per cent, the bosses of the UK's top 350 companies are rewarding themselves pay increases that are almost six times bigger.

"Some shareholders are trying to keep a lid on executive pay, but these figures suggest that remuneration committees are still finding ways of inflating the overall reward package.

"It's time for shareholders to pay more attention to the total amount paid out to directors and concern themselves more with the gulf opening up between top bosses' pay and that of the rest of the workforce. Otherwise we'll continue to see these huge increases in directors' pay year on year."

While the Government had proposed legislation to curb "fat-cat" pay packages, this was abandoned following a review.

All the top FTSE-350 companies put the issue to a shareholder vote at their annual meetings.

(SP/KMcA)