Directors’ pay soars 14 per cent in the past year
The Income Data Services (IDS) has calculated that pay for senior directors has risen by 14 per cent over the past year. The average pay for a director of a FTSE 100 company totalled £3.3m. The IDS confirmed that the basic pay rises has been "relatively restrained" and bonuses had fallen by 8.8 per cent. The rise in pay is largely down to an increase in share-based incentive payments of 58 per cent.
Steve Tatton, of the IDS, said:
These divergent pay trends highlight the complex make-up of boardroom remuneration, illustrating that while one part of a director's pay package may go down, another part may go up.
With nearly two-thirds of FTSE directors benefiting from an LTIP award in the latest year, the higher share-based payouts clearly made up for any ground lost in lower annual bonuses.
The news of increasing pay for top directors was, unsurprisingly, met with hostility and derision by the head of the TUC, Frances O'Grady:
Britain's top bosses are back to their old tricks as their pay is growing 20 times faster than the average worker.
It's one thing replacing bonuses with long-term incentive plans, but FTSE 100 companies are simply exploiting this change to make their fat cats even fatter.