Article – BusinessDesk

Jan. 27 (BusinessDesk) – Christchurch City Council’s Chief Executive Tony Marryatt has instructed the council’s payroll office to stop paying him a controversial salary increase from today, citing negative publicly and public opinion.

Under pressure Christchurch council boss rejects pay rise

Jan. 27 (BusinessDesk) – Christchurch City Council’s Chief Executive Tony Marryatt has instructed the council’s payroll office to stop paying him a controversial salary increase from today, citing negative publicly and public opinion.

He will give back any increase he has received to date.

The move comes after Local Government Minister Nick Smith said he would get officials to look at a letter from Michael Gousmett, of Rangiora, who wrote to the minister requesting an inquiry into the salary increase.

Marryatt defended his 14.4 percent pay rise from criticism that the earthquake-devastated city had better things to spend its money on.

The increase took his pay to $538,529 from $470,400 a year, effective from July 1, 2011.

Marryatt said he did not want the issue of his pay to affect the rebuild of “this great city”.

“The negative publicity and public opinion has been tough for staff at the organisation and has the potential to distract this council from the very important task at hand of rebuilding our city,” he said.

“I want to show my commitment to Christchurch, to the council and to all our staff. I want to lead our team through the rebuild.”

Christchurch was devastated by a magnitude 6.3 earthquake on February 22 last year.

(BusinessDesk)

Content Sourced from scoop.co.nz
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