Auckland Council salaries: 86 officials earn more than $250,000

Brian from New Lynn

Figures released by the Auckland Ratepayers' Alliance today say that 48 staff earn more than Mayor Phil Goff's salary of $296,000. Seven staff at the council earn more than Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern, whose annual salary is $471,000, the alliance claims. The list collated publicly available information about the pay of staff earning over $250,000, Auckland Ratepayers' Alliance spokeswoman Jo Holmes said. The alliance says 71 per cent of those identified on the list are men, including all six of the staff who are paid more than $500,000. On the list are 24 Auckland Transport employees, 11 from Watercare, six from Regional Facilities Auckland, five from ATEED, and five from Panuku Development. In an April 17 letter Auckland Council chief executive Stephen Town told the lobby group its figures were inaccurate. The council agreed there was a degree of public interest in the value of senior roles and had earlier provided salary bands - without names - attributable to senior council and CCO roles. The council believed that response met public interest, transparency and accountability requirements. The ratepayer group published that letter itself to show it had attempted to check the accuracy of its information before publishing. Holmes said publishing today's "Town Hall Rich List" was "an exercise in transparency and accountability". "If someone is paid more than a government minister, ratepayers should at the very least know who they are and what they do." However Town said in the letter that despite the inaccuracies, the council would not be correcting or confirming the salary figures or the names of the people concerned as it would be an "unacceptable intrusion into their privacy". Town referred to a previous Ombudsman's decision in which a request for specific details about Christchurch City Council salaries was refused, on the basis that privacy issues outweighed the public interest in releasing the information. "We object to you targeting specific council group employees and pressuring them to release their personal information. We ask you to refrain from doing so and to make any further requests for information through the official and proper channels," Town wrote.
But the alliance told Town that it had collated the figures using publicly available information - it had then taken the extra step of emailing those concerned to ask them if they wished to correct or clarify any information. "We totally reject your assertion that the Rich List is an 'unacceptable intrusion into [the] privacy' of the individuals listed... These aren't frontline or lowly paid anonymous staff. "Without exception, those listed are in senior positions," the alliance said.
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