Wrexham Councillor Pay Increase Likely To Be Enforced Despite Opposition

Increases to councillor allowances are likely to be forced on Wrexham Council despite widespread opposition from its members.

In February we reported how members of the executive board would see their pay go up by £9,000 to £28,780 under recommendations by the Independent Remuneration Panel for Wales.

Despite councillors voicing strong opposition to the rise at a time when public sector pay has been frozen, they were told at last night’s full council meeting that the authority may face legal action if it did not accept the proposals.

Pay for the Leader of the Council will go up slightly from £47,278 to £47,500 and all 52 councillors will see their basic allowance increase from £12,681 to £13,175.

The Mayor will receive £21,375 including their basic salary to carry out their civil role, up by £1,500.

Labour’s executive board members said that they would be donating the £9,000 increase to a local charity with the rest of the group of 23 saying that they would do the same with any rise in pay they received.

Labour’s Neil Rogers, Leader of the Council said: “I’m pleased to say that at the first meeting of the Labour party after the elections, my colleagues had a discussion and all Labour councillors won’t be taking the increase. We intend to donate it to a charity in the town.”

Leader of Wrexham Independents Cllr David A Bithell also expressed his desire to donate the £9,000 extra he would receive to charity and said that other members of his group were considering it too. The Conservative group joined others in voicing their concerns.

The only member to speak in favour of the rise in remuneration was new deputy leader Cllr Mark Pritchard who said: “I am delighted that the IRP have set this up so that we can have consistency. I was uncomfortable with councillors setting their own salaries under the scale process.”

However, speaking after the meeting Cllr Bithell described the new deputy’s comments as inappropriate, he said: “I don’t think that a £14k pay increase as deputy is fair at a time when public sector pay is frozen.”

Pay for the deputy leader post is set to increase to £33,460 under the recommendations.