Remuneration fair and “fit for purpose”

09 November 2011 In its first annual report, the National Assembly for Wales’s independent Remuneration Board says that salaries and allowances in Cardiff Bay must “fit the purpose” for members of a legislature.

“AMs have to hold the Government to account in the Chamber and committees,” said Board Chair George Reid.

“They have to legislate. They have to represent their electors and parties. Their remuneration should ensure they can do so in a fair and transparent way.

“It should represent value for money and it should reflect these responsibilities in a Welsh context.”

In its wide-ranging first Determination of March 2011, the Board restructured the allowances which had been put in place “in rather ad hoc fashion” over the first three Assemblies and targeted resources towards more sustained scrutiny work by Members.

• AMs’ salaries are frozen at £53,852 for four years;

• The number of AMs entitled to accommodation in Cardiff is cut from 51 to 25, on a rent-only basis;

• The allowance for support staff is increased to £89,000;

• All new Members must appoint, in a publicly advertised process, one member of staff to provide research capacity and support them in formal committee and plenary business;

• Staff salaries are frozen until at least April 2013. Bonus payments have been abolished;

• At the end of the Fourth Assembly, only Members defeated at elections will be entitled to a resettlement grant.

Overall, the Board’s decisions, including those published in July, are anticipated to save around £2 million over the next four years.

Mr Reid commented that “culture change takes time”, but that monitoring of recruitment and resource disposition indicated that Members were taking up the challenge, following the Referendum, of being “fully fledged legislators”.

The Board is now engaged in a full review of Assembly Members’ pensions, while simultaneously evaluating the impact of its earlier decisions.