Company director pay soars as bonuses return

A REVIVAL of bonuses for directors at blue-chip companies boosted their pay packets by 55 per cent this year, as research showed executive earnings bounced back to pre-recession levels.

FTSE 100 chief executives earned an average of 4.9m in the 12 months to June according to Income Data Services, a unit of Thomson Reuters, with the average bonus of directors of the country's top companies rising by 34 per cent.

Soaring director pay at a time when the rest of the country is facing big public spending cuts is likely to catch the attention of Business Secretary Vince Cable who has in the past criticised high executive pay levels, specifically bank bonuses.

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FTSE 100 executives earned 88 times the average pay of full-time workers, the data showed, as the salaries of top executives headed back towards their 2008 peak multiple of 94 times average wages after dipping during the 2009 recession.

The best paid director across the FTSE 350 was Reckitt Benckiser's Bart Becht who earned 92.6m.

Executives from housebuilder Berkeley, miner Xstrata, gas firm BG Group and supermarket group Tesco were among the other top earners taking home between 38m and 18m each.

Shareholders have been taking a more robust line on management pay during the economic downturn, although they have rarely forced through any changes. Tesco, for instance, faced an investor backlash against its remuneration report in July.

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