Charity chief under fire for £232,000 salary package
THE head of a taxpayerfunded environmental charity has become one of the highest paid bosses in the voluntary sector after his remuneration rose by 50 per cent to £232,000.
James Thornton, the head of Clientearth, is now the highest paid green charity boss in Britain, with his pay outstripping the heads of Greenpeace, WWF and Friends of the Earth.
The charity, which is based in east London, received nearly £1 million in funding from the Department for International Development last year.
It rose to prominence after mounting three successful legal challenges against the Government which forced politicians to overhaul air pollution strategies in towns and cities.
Mr Thornton earned £80,000 more than the Prime Minister last year, and his pay also outstripped the earnings of the bosses of some of Britain’s biggest charities including the RSPCA, the NSPCC and the National Trust.
Priti Patel, a former international development secretary, said: “There is no justification for this extraordinarily high salary for the chief executive of a charity which receives taxpayer funding.”
A spokesman for Clientearth confirmed that Mr Thornton had received a £45,000 pay rise in 2017 which was topped up by a “one-off” pension contribution of £32,093 to recognise “historic underpayments”.
The spokesman said: “He abandoned a highly lucrative career in commercial law to dedicate his life to the legal defence of the Earth. James has unrivalled experience in his field. His remuneration reflects this.”
Mr Thornton’s pay is significantly higher than the bosses of other green charities. Clientearth has 100 employees and an income of £11 million. By contrast the boss of the World Wildlife Fund, which has an income of £60million and 333 employees, is paid £132,000.
Clientearth has received more than £3 million from the Department for International Development over the past three years.
It used to be a subject of comment that footballers were paid more than the Prime Minister. Now it’s charity bosses. James Thornton, the head of Clientearth, is the highest-paid green charity boss in Britain. He may be worth every penny of his £232,000 a year, and it’s Clientearth’s business what he earns – except that last year the organisation received nearly £1 million from the Department for International Development (DFID). That makes this a matter of public interest. Some readers might also find it strange that the Government finances a lobby group that tries to shape government policy.
DFID’S ring-fenced foreign spend now exceeds the amount that goes on policing in England and Wales, a point made well on BBC Question Time by Kate Andrews of the Institute of Economic Affairs. How can Britain spend so much overseas, she asked, when crime is perceived to be out of control at home? The point isn’t that Britain should be miserly: foreign aid is not only humanitarian but, by helping countries develop, can be a smart investment for trade and security. But the notion that it has to be fixed rigidly at 0.7 per cent of national income is absurd and likely to encourage profligacy.
Priti Patel, a former international development secretary, says Clientearth must be held to account for the cash it receives. Certainly, DFID needs to win back public confidence on how it distributes funds. It is in danger of damaging the reputation of foreign aid and the charitable sector, feeding the impression that it would be more efficient in some cases if the UK just burned taxpayers’ money.