Pay for FTSE100 bosses has jumped 5 per cent during the past two years despite falls in share value.
The Total Remuneration Survey 2010, by pay consultancy MM&K and shareholder voting agency Manifest, found that chief executives’ total pay packages quadrupled during the past decade – to today’s average of £3.1 million a year.
The remuneration deals are increasingly made up of short-term annual bonus incentives as opposed to salaries or long-term share options. There have been some signs of shareholder unrest. Some 47 per cent of Tesco’s institutional shareholders objected to paying £7 million to Tim Mason, 52, the boss of the supermarket giant’s underperforming Fresh & Easy chain in California.
Marks & Spencer shareholders have also grumbled about the £15.1 million pay deal for new chief executive Marc Bolland and the £2.8 million bonus for his departing predecessor Sir Stuart Rose.
Meanwhile, Incomes Data Services reported that public sector pay deals lag behind the private sector. Its survey of more than 2.1 million employees in the three months to June found that the median pay rise offered in private firms was two per cent, compared to 0.8 per cent for public servants. Retail price inflation was 5.1 per cent in May.
