Birmingham City Council chief picked up £233,000 last year
Birmingham City Council chief executive Stephen Hughes pocketed £233,000 in salary and pension contributions last year at a time when the city council braces itself for tens of thousands of job cuts, it has been revealed.
The figures were released on the day of the Comprehensive Spending Review and as Local Government Secretary Eric Pickles told the Birmingham Post that council’s should share chief executives to protect front line services.
Mr Pickles told local authorities to share senior managers to cope with seeing their budgets slashed by more than a quarter.
Mr Hughes is the highest earner at the Council House, where 13 officials are paid more than £100,000.
Following Government instructions, the council has for the first time published full details of salary packages enjoyed by senior directors.
Mr Hughes’s basic pay rose from £191,253 in 2008/9 to £204,810 in 2009/10 – an increase of seven per cent. But with contributions paid by the council into his local government pension plan, the chief executive’s total package was £233,097.
The figure was described as “scandalous” by the regional secretary of public service union Unison, Roger McKenzie, who pointed out that Mr Hughes had been in the forefront of persuading the Government to freeze local government pay.
Mr McKenzie, who is leading a campaign against council spending cuts, said: “It is hypocritical that officials like Mr Hughes, who are so well paid, should be intent on putting our low paid members out of work.
“It is absolutely outrageous that he should have been awarded a seven per cent wage rise.
“We have called on Stephen Hughes to resign before, and I repeat that again.”
Mr Hughes also finds himself firmly in the firing line of Local Government secretary Eric Pickles, who told this month’s Conservative conference in Birmingham that council bosses should cut their “ludicrous” pay.
Chief executives earning more than £200,000 could afford to take a 10 per cent cut of their salary because it would enable them to “look council workers in the eye”, Mr Pickles suggested.
By contrast, Prime Minister David Cameron’s salary is £142,500.
A council spokeswoman defended Mr Hughes, adding that he was well paid because he ran a £3.5 billion business with 55,000 staff.
