Tesco is Britain’s most unequal blue chip firm, The Mail on Sunday’s annual audit of boardroom pay reveals right now.
Ken Murphy, chief government of the nation’s greatest grocery store, made £10million in 2023, which is 431 occasions the sum obtained by a typical Tesco employee. He made extra in a day than Tesco’s UK workers did on common all yr.
The dimensions of the pay hole on the grocery chain dwarfs that of different FTSE 100 firms.
Audit: Tesco is Britain’s most unequal blue chip firm, The Mail on Sunday’s annual audit of boardroom pay reveals right now
Compass, whose boss Dominic Blakemore was paid 303 occasions the sum paid to the common worker on the contract catering enterprise, got here subsequent on the checklist.
Others with massive pay gaps between the boss and the remainder embody retailers Sainsbury’s, B&Q-owner Kingfisher and clothes large Subsequent.
The findings type a part of The Mail on Sunday’s Fats Cat Recordsdata, which chart the hundreds of thousands of kilos handed out every year in wage, bonuses and perks to the bosses of Britain’s greatest firms.
The audit exhibits that in 2023:
– FTSE 100 chief executives have been paid a median of £4.7million – a £300,000 rise on the earlier yr
– AstraZeneca’s Pascal Soriot was once more the best paid FTSE 100 boss, taking house £16.9million
– The most effective paid feminine FTSE 100 boss was Emma Walmsley at rival medicine group GSK on £12.7million
– The variety of bosses paid greater than £10million doubled to eight
– Finance administrators additionally fared properly, pocketing greater than £2.2million every on common
– The best paid finance chiefs have been defence large BAE’s Brad Greve and Nick Luff on the info and analytics firm Relx. They each acquired £7.1million
– Virtually 1 / 4 of FTSE 100 finance administrators – typically a stepping stone to the chief government’s job – are actually feminine, elevating hopes that girls could lastly break by way of the glass ceiling
Within the cash: Ken Murphy, chief government of Tesco, made £10m in 2023
Our findings will gas the controversy about ballooning boardroom pay. They arrive as prime companies push for even greater rewards for his or her leaders, saying they must be paid extra to compete with US rivals.
The standard FTSE 100 chief government earns 120 occasions greater than their staff’ median pay, in response to the Excessive Pay Centre think-tank, however quickly they might be taking house much more.
Sixteen of the highest 100 companies wish to revamp their pay insurance policies, in response to enterprise consultancy Deloitte.
9 of the businesses have drawn up ‘radical’ plans to spice up their boss’s pay this yr, in contrast with 4 earlier than.
Amongst these main calls to pay bosses primarily based in Britain much more is Rupert Soames, president of the Confederation of British Business foyer group.
He has dubbed many firms within the FTSE 100 as ‘Brilos’ – ‘British in Itemizing Solely’ – as a result of most of their income come from abroad.
Soames additionally chairs Smith & Nephew, the medical gear group, the place practically half of its shareholders voted in opposition to plans to provide chief government Deepak Nath an enormous pay rise.
It was the most important investor revolt at a significant firm final yr, the Fats Cat Recordsdata discovered.
Additionally main the cost on chief government pay is Julia Hoggett. The London Inventory Alternate chief government has warned {that a} ‘lack of a stage enjoying discipline’ is driving a mind drain from the Metropolis to New York and past.
Shareholders backed plans to greater than double the pay of her boss, David Schwimmer, to £13.2million.
Corporations comparable to chipmaker Arm Holdings, plumbing large Ferguson and Tarmac-owner CRH have already moved their predominant itemizing from London to Wall Avenue, the place sky-high boardroom pay is extra broadly tolerated.
The huge sums on supply to US chief executives was highlighted this month when Brian Niccol, new boss of Seattle-based espresso chain Starbucks, was given a pay bundle probably price greater than £78million – with permission to work remotely from California.
US-style: Brian Niccol, the brand new boss of Seattle-based espresso chain Starbucks, was given a pay bundle probably price greater than £78m
Not all prime bosses made pay hay final yr. NatWest’s Alison Rose missed out on £5.1million after she was ousted over the de-banking of Reform UK chief Nigel Farage.
However her loss was minor in contrast with Bernard Looney’s at BP. He was docked £3million in pay and forfeited as much as £29million in share awards after he was discovered to have lied to the board about his private relationships with different workers.
Tesco defended Murphy’s award. Alison Platt, chair of the remuneration committee that units government pay, stated on the time it recognised ‘the robust efficiency of the enterprise’ and ‘the actual fact Tesco had delivered for all of its stakeholders over the past yr’, together with ‘report funding in colleague pay’.
Further analysis by Angus Ritchie
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