Clarity call by Lord Mayor on executive pay

David Wootton, the first Yorkshireman to hold the office since 1955, spoke out during a visit to Yorkshire to promote the role of the City and how it can help companies in the region.

The issue of executive pay is high up the political agenda with the Government set to unveil plans tomorrow to crack down on excessive remuneration.

Mr Wootton said: “Business needs to be clearer in explaining the reason for pay and how pay is merited and what it’s for.

“At the moment, the messages are very confused. Is it high pay for failure that’s the problem or is it just high pay? Is it in a particular sector or is it across the board?”

“All the statistics about rises in pay are in fact across the whole of UK business, but then it’s just lumped in the City so I think business needs to be clearer in explaining how pay is made up and the justifications for it – more transparency – and it needs to be clearer about the market place in which pay is set.

“The UK is part of the global economy; in particular the City of London is part of global financial services. We are not a domestic market, we are an international one and that has a huge effect on pay, particularly at the top level, and we need to do a better job at explaining how this comes into pay that you see.”

Bradford-born Mr Wootton, a partner at elite law firm Allen & Overy since 1979, plans to use his year in office to improve the reputation of the City in Britain and promote British business abroad.

Speaking during a visit to Leeds, the 61-year-old said: “I’m here to find out about the mood of the business community, how things are seen as likely to develop and to collect sales material.

“I make a large number of business visits overseas during the year and I’m promoting the whole of UK business.

“I’m expanding my portfolio of parts of British business to sell, so to speak, and I’m going to be encouraging Leeds business to come on the visits.

“I’m also encouraging Leeds business to see the City as a platform to promote what they’ve got to offer within London and internationally.

“It’s all part of an effort which the City is making to show that it’s rather more connected up to the rest of the country than perhaps people think it is.

“There’s a perception that it has been disconnected.

“There is a perception that the City has contributed to aspects of the current difficulties, the banking crisis, etc.

“All of which is blamed on the City even if aspects of it are not the City’s fault.”

Mr Wootton visited manufacturers Surgical Innovations and ATB Morley in Leeds on Friday. He stayed with the Bishop of Bradford at the weekend and today is due to visit Curtis Wool, Pace plc, Ecology Building Society, Advanced Actuators, Acorn Stairlifts and Pennine Weavers.

He told the Yorkshire Post that his office could help SME manufacturers move into international trade, make connections abroad and attract investor interest.

Last week, Chancellor George Osborne used a visit to Hong Kong to announce plans to make the UK the home of Asian investment and Asian finance in the West.

Mr Wootton said this could benefit Yorkshire, both in terms of new infrastructure investment and backing for advanced manufacturing, which is rich in intellectual property.

His year in office began in November. He will regard it as a success “if I had shifted the perception of the City to the UK and if I could point to some success in connecting up British businesses with opportunities overseas and doing that in a way that is coordinated with other initiatives”.

He described the disconnect between the City and the regions as “more perception than reality”.

“There’s a perception that London is interested in overseas, that London is interested in what’s going on in the South East rather more than in the North of England,” he said.

“There is more interest, but we need to show that there is more interest so we deal with that perception.”

He predicted that “banker bashing” would continue until the politicians and the media saw that it ought to stop, which is either going to happen when the public tell them to stop or when bankers, the City, private sector business, demonstrates convincingly that it’s doing a good job in a way which addresses all these issues and probably when a certain amount of confidence returns to the economy”.

Mr Wootton added: “Part of my job is to make a contribution to turning those perceptions around. I’m not a spokesman for banks in isolation. There are a lot of banks in the City, but there are banks elsewhere.

“I’m a spokesman for UK business as a whole so we are just as critical of banks in certain respects as anybody else is, we just might do it in a different way.”

Mr Wootton grew up in Horton Bank Top and Shipley and went to Bradford Grammar School. His father still lives in Silsden.

Last Yorkshire holder of office

The last time a Yorkshireman was Lord Mayor of the City of London was 1955, when Sir Cuthbert Lowell Ackroyd held the office.

He was born in 1892, went to school in Dewsbury and served his country in the First World War as a captain in the Royal Artillery.

Sir Cuthbert is notable as the first person to buy a Premium Bond in 1956. He was created 1st Baronet Ackroyd, of Dewsbury later that year.

His family had connections to the wool trade in Bradford, Witney in Oxfordshire and London.