People are quite rightly surprised at the headline figure of the interim chief finance officer of Somerset Council, writes Cllr Bill Revans.
“More than the Prime Minister” screams the headline.
A headline about the price.
Not about the value.
The Prime Minister gets £75,440 in addition to his MP’s salary of £98,599.
A total of £174,039.
Most recent Prime Ministers have earned more before and after being in office.
Prime Ministers also have access to extensive, fully staffed properties, including 10 Downing Street and the country houses of Chequers, Dorneywood, Chevening, and Stormont.
They get round-the-clock security for the rest of their lives, a £115,000 annual expenses allowance, and a generous pension in retirement.
Plus free air travel and a chauffeured car.
The fringe benefits are significant.
The Prime Minister’s official salary is less than five per cent of the average take-home pay of the chief executives of the UK’s top FTSE 100 companies.
Maybe the question is, why do we value the role of Prime Minister so lowly?
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Is it because it’s an elected office rather than a professional role that requires no formal qualifications or job application?
There is certainly no shortage of applicants.
I will leave the quality we get for others to judge.
Let us not forget longevity either.
There are 278 government senior officials (and 57 senior BBC staff funded by licence fee payers) who are known to be paid more than the Prime Minister.
The top three high earners include the chief executive officer of HS2, the chief executive officer of Network Rail, and the director general of the BBC, each earning over half a million pounds annually.
Premier League football players are paid on average £3.5 to £4m per year.
Erling Haaland of Manchester City gets £27.3m a year.
So is Somerset’s chief finance officer Clive Heaphy the Erling Haaland of local government finance?
He’s a fellow of the Chartered Institute of Public Finance Accountancy, he’s been a chief executive and chief financial officer of various councils in a 40-year career.
He’s only with us for one season.
He’s very much with us for a 'troubleshooting' role.
And we hope to have a permanent appointment in the new year.
He’s absolutely the best person for the job.
Putting Somerset Council back on the road to recovery has not been an easy job.
Getting experts in costs money, but adds value.
Day rate comparisons are often misleading because interim roles are short-term and do not include pensions, employers’ and employee’s National Insurance, holiday pay, and other costs.
By moving to a unitary council, we've saved nearly £5m per year on senior salaries, for example, by employing one chief finance officer rather than five.
Better value at a lower overall price.
“Somerset Council saves 25 times Prime Minister’s salary on top earners' pay” doesn’t get the clicks and shares, though.
We’ve been clear throughout that Somerset Council has a difficult inherited financial position from the Conservative-led Somerset County Council.
The Somerset Council Lib Dem administration has worked hard to reduce the deficit from an enormous £123m - when we declared a financial emergency - and we are now in recovery, working towards a budget without exceptional financial support in 27/28.
All alternative routes would have led to s114 bankruptcy, double-digit council tax rises, and expensive commissioners running the council, asset-stripping Somerset and slashing services.
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