Agenda and minutes

To remind Members of the need to record the existence and nature of any Personal, Disclosable Pecuniary or other interests in items on the agenda, in accordance with the Members’ Code of Conduct.

The Committee considered a report (Agenda Item 4) concerning the Council’s Pay Policy Statement which it was required to publish by the 01^st April 2014. Robert O’ Reilly in introducing the report explained that the Council produced the report in order to comply with the requirements of S38 of the Localism Act 2011 and the Code of Practice (the Code) for Local Authorities on Data Transparency.

The Head of HR explained that the Localism Act 2011 required local authorities to publish an annual pay policy statement from 2012. The Code included a requirement to publish a set of data relating to the remuneration and responsibilities of senior officers. Officers felt that it would be useful to combine the information into a single document which would be presented to full Council in accordance with the requirements.

Robert O’ Reilly noted that much of the information in the policy was the same as the previous year. Discussions were however underway about linking pay to performance and this would be reflected in subsequent iterations of the policy should the proposals be approved. It was also noted that the Council was still well within the pay ratios set out in the Hutton Review of Fair Pay in the Public Sector. The Review stated that the ratio of highest paid to lowest paid should not exceed 20:1. West Berkshire Council’s ration was currently at 10.7:1.

Officers explained that Appendix A to the policy set out the salaries and other income (car allowance, National Insurance, honoraria etc) for all senior managers (Chief Executive, Corporate Directors and Heads of Service),  Appendix B set out the budget and staffing responsibilities for these senior managers,  Appendix C set out the responsibilities (extracted from their Job Descriptions) of the Chief Executive and Corporate Directors and Appendix D set out all the pay scales for Council employees.

Members asked for the following minor amendments to be made to the document prior to it being referred to Council for approval:

·        The Pay Policy Statement to be referred to as Appendix 1 (with the appendices to that document being listed as A, B, C and D);

·        Explanatory text as to what a ‘mean salary’ and ‘median salary’ was.

Members also requested that a note explaining why Mark Evans had received an honorarium payment of £1100 be circulated to the committee outside of the meeting.

RESOLVED that the Pay Policy Statement be referred to full Council for approval subject to the inclusion of the amendments set out above.