MPs get $4000 bonus with more to come

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MPS have been given a $4000 Christmas bonus – and can look forward to another pay rise in the new year.

The Remuneration Authority – the independent body which sets politicians' pay – announced yesterday a 1.4 per cent rise, which it said was less than inflation and in line with other public servants.

It takes a backbencher's basic salary from $131,000 to $134,800. Prime Minister John Key will now get $400,500.

The average New Zealand wage is $49,474 a year.

The MPs' increase will be backdated to July, and includes a $2000 payout which the authority awarded because MPs have not been using their international travel allowance. Their tax free allowances – which pay for gifts, entertaining and other expenses – will also rise to $15,300.

The travel perk was scrapped last month, after landing a series of MPs in hot water. Once that is formally announced the authority will make another determination.

In July, a parliamentary appropriations review committee said MPs should get an extra 10 per cent if the allowance was dumped.

Public Service Association national secretary Richard Wagstaff said it was "true to a point" that the rise reflected other public sector pay deals.

"But when you are on salaries many times what the average person is on, then 1.4 per cent turns into thousands of dollars, instead of hundreds, when they've already got thousands of dollars.

"The Government itself has been very vociferous on insisting on no backdating for public service workers. I'm assuming they are accepting backdating for themselves without so much as a blink of an eye."

Mr Wagstaff, whose union represents 57,000 workers, said: "The average worker finds the Remuneration Authority hard to decipher because the same logic doesn't apply to New Zealand workers."

Authority chairman John Errington said there was "a strong argument" for an increase because MPs were not using the travel discount as often and saving the taxpayer money.

Registered nurses earn, on average, $65,000 a year. They won a 2 per cent pay increase in March but must wait for the new year for it to kick in.

Nurses Organisation industrial adviser Glenda Alexander said the MPs' pay rise was a hard pill to swallow after constraints were urged in the public sector.

Teachers have been wrangling with the Government all year over pay. Primary school teachers finally agreed to a 2.75 per cent rise plus a payout of $300 this month. Secondary school teachers have yet to settle and may strike next year.

PPTA president Kate Gainsford said that after four years of training, teachers started on $45,000 and could rise to $68,000. She recognised that MPs worked hard but "teachers work just as hard" and had been told time and again there was "no money" for wage rises.

A police constable starts on about $57,000 a year including benefits. This year police agreed to a one-off payment of $1000 at July 1 and a 1.3 per cent wage increase from July 1, 2011.

JUDGES' PAY BOOST LEAVES COURT CLERKS FAR BEHIND

Judges will enjoy salary increases of nearly three times those handed out to politicians.

The increase in judges' salaries – 3.7 per cent back-paid to October – means an increase of between $12,000 and $16,000 for the year. That takes top-earning Chief Justice Dame Sian Elias to $453,500, while the lowest-paid judges, at the Maori Land Court, will be bumped up to $288,500.

Earlier this year justice workers staged a rally outside the opening of the new Supreme Court to protest against what they called an unjust pay system in the sector.

Most court registry officers get between $39,600 and $46,600 a year, and justice workers struggled to get any pay rise, Public Service Association national secretary Richard Wagstaff said.

"It's interesting that [judges] so easily got pay rises that far exceed the average."

- © Fairfax NZ News