Councillors’ allowances and expenses costs down for fifth year

The Council has today published how much each of its elected members received in the financial year up to April 2014.

The payments are published on www.telford.gov.uk/opencouncil which holds a range of information including how much councillors are paid, the salaries of the Council’s most senior managers and everything the Council buys costing more than £100.

The figures show that last year councillors and co-optees, lay members of the public appointed to help the council, received £615,666 in allowances – flat rate payments made to councillors for the roles they perform.

All councillors receive a basic allowance and some councillors receive further allowance payments for special responsibilities such as performing a cabinet or scrutiny role or holding a post such as Mayor.

The figures also show that in the year 2013/14 councillors and co-optees were reimbursed a total of £2,698.40 in expenses, bringing the overall figure for allowances and reimbursement of expenses incurred to £618,364.68 which is £1,187 less than the previous year. The previous year’s figure was £619,551.74.

Council leader Kuldip Sahota said: “One of the cornerstones of a co-operative council is being very open and honest with our residents about where public money is spent and publishing the payments made to councillors is a very important part of that process.

“In these hard economic times, every effort is made to reduce those payments and I am pleased that the overall figure for allowances and expenses has fallen for the fifth year running, while members of the cabinet have again chosen to reduce their special responsibilities allowance by ten per cent.”