An SDLP councillor has scolded a local authority for not awarding itself a pay allowance recommendation.
SDLP Councillor Joe Boyle, the sole Nationalist representative at Ards and North Down Borough Council, chastised fellow councillors for not following a recommended remuneration allowance for councillors, involving back payment for unclaimed special responsibility allowances.
Earlier this month councillors at committee level at the local authority agreed to give themselves a pay rise for their basic annual allowance, from £17,030 to the new maximum of £17,456. The move followed a Stormont Department for Communities circular increasing the maximum basic and special responsibility allowances for local elected representatives.
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At the March meeting of the Corporate Committee councillors “noted” an item recommending approval of the revised scheme of allowances and paying all members for unclaimed special allowances in respect of the current financial year, with “no action to be taken”.
At the meeting councillors approved the scheme of allowances for 2025-26 except in relation to the payments for chairing meetings, where they agreed to “continue with the current arrangements”.
Ards and North Down councillors approved an increase in the basic allowance last year, to the maximum set by DfC for the 2023/24 year - this was the first increase they voted for in four years.
In January this year councillors at Belfast City Council denied themselves a pay rise for the fourth year in a row, and agreed to give power over their wage to an “outside” body.
The Ards and North Down Council decision for 2025-26 was ratified at the full council meeting at Bangor Castle this week. While not forcing a vote on the matter, at the meeting Councillor Joe Boyle fully aired his disapproval of the approach from fellow members.
He said: “I wish to be recorded as disagreeing with proposing 'to note' the item, which effectively is denying and depriving elected members what they are entitled to.” He said other councils across from the same parties “had no bother accepting the (Stormont) department’s documentations and recommendations.”
He added: “I thought as a council we were moving on, because we nearly had to be dragged kicking and screaming after two or three years there, to bring ourselves into the real world, where the rest of the councils are.
“Yet here we are again, making suggestions that this should not be accepted. I am not so sure what the fear is here at all. I wish someone would explain it to me why we won’t take what the department is offering, what 10 and if not nine other councils are all taking.
“Why should we be playing catch-up, why should we be in Ballygo-backwards mode?”
He said: “I know there are (party) group leaders who are speaking for them all, and they have obviously concocted this, but believe me when I say there are many members in all those (parties) who don’t entirely agree with what is being put forward by their group leaders, and who don’t have permission to go against it.”
He added: “If members don’t wish to accept their rightful entitlement, that’s fine, but it is no great prize, it is their rightful entitlement. Give it to your local youth club, or sports club, or whatever. Equality has to be front and centre for all 462 elected members across our 11 councils.”
A council report states: “The policy of claiming Special Responsibility Allowance was introduced a number of years ago to allow for the recognition of members (generally vice chairs) who were not committee chairs, but on occasion chaired meetings and did not receive any recompense for that responsibility.
“A number of members had raised an issue that as a result of needing to claim special responsibility allowance some councillors were not doing so and therefore not getting what was owed to them. Officers reviewed the payment information which bore that out, with the average number of SRAs paid each month during the current financial year being 11.
“The policy would therefore appear to be disadvantageous to more members than it was helping and therefore the revised scheme of allowances proposed reverting to the previous policy of paying committee chairs an SRA each month automatically. As a result, no other members may claim an SRA for chairing a meeting, in order not to breach the statutory limit of 20 members receiving an SRA.”
Councillors at the committee level agreed to “note” this recommendation and not to adopt it, and this decision was sealed at the full council.
Despite this, the basic allowance for councillors at Ards and North Down has been increased from £17,030 to the new maximum of £17,456, as allowed by Stormont. The basic allowance includes an element for “incidental and consumable costs” incurred by councillors in their official capacity, worth an extra £1,229.
Councillors also voted to raise the dependent carer’s standard monthly allowance from £595 to £635, and specialist monthly allowance from £1,190 to £1,270.
A special responsibility allowance is also paid to those councillors carrying out special responsibilities, such as chairing committee meetings, and substantial extra allowances are given to the Mayor and deputy Mayor.
The Mayor’s extra allowance is £14,880, while for the Deputy Mayor it is £7,440.
The extra allowance for chairing committees can range from £2,250 for the Audit Committee to £5,110 for the Corporate Services Committee. Other allowances include memberships of certain committees and panels, Chair of the Policing and Community Safety Partnership, and dependents carer allowance.
Councillors at the Ards and North Down Corporate Services Committee voted to up their basic pay, but to keep the mayoral allowances and allowance scheme for chairing committees the same as last year.
There was no raise in mayoral allowances or chairing allowances recommended, but rather a slight reduction in the allowance recommended for the Corporate Services Committee Chair. Councillors did not vote for this.
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