Three chief information officers are among the highest
paid civil servants in Whitehall, with salaries that outstrip the
salaries of the
prime minister and the most senior leaders in
government.
The salaries reflect the importance placed by the government and
the civil service on the
IT-based modernisation of some large central departments. The
three top-paid CIOs are running IT-based change programmes that
together are worth at least £16bn.
Research by Computer Weekly has established that the three -
Steve Lamey of HM Revenue and Customs,
Joe Harley of the Department for Work and Pensions, and
Richard Granger, director general of NHS IT - received salaries
which were more than that of the highest ranking civil servant,
Cabinet secretary Gus O'Donnell.
They also earn more than their bosses and permanent secretaries
who run other departments, such as the Treasury and the Foreign and
Commonwealth Office. Their salaries are between £240,000 and
£285,000 - at least 25% more than the salary of Gordon Brown.
The pay is more than twice the average for CIOs in the private
and public sectors. A
CIO survey conducted by recruitment consultancy Harvey Nash
last year put the average salary at £104,000, compared with £84,800
the previous year.
And beyond Whitehall, non-civil servants who work for the wider
public sector can earn even larger sums than Lamey, Granger or
Harley.
David Burden, group CIO at Royal Mail, earned £359,000 in
2006.
Cathy Holley, a partner at executive search specialist Boyden,
said that the government must offer good salaries to attract people
who have a track record of successfully transforming organisations
of enormous size and complexity.
But it is more than the salary that
coaxes top IT directors to the public sector - in the private
sector, CIOs can earn more than £1m. Richard Granger has said that
the public sector "attracts people not primarily motivated by
money, but dedicated to delivering a public service".
However, not all government CIOs earn salaries of more than
£200,000. The Ministry of Justice is recruiting an IT director at a
salary of up to £110,000. And
Ian Watmore, the former government CIO and now head of the
Prime Minister's Delivery Unit, earned about £195,000.
Steve Lamey
Title: Chief information officer and director
general, HM Revenue and Customs.
Salary: £240,000 to £245,000 in the year
2006-07, according to the department's annual report.
How does this compare with his boss's salary?
The permanent head of HM Revenue and Customs earned between
£170,000 and £180,000. The other board directors earned less than
£200,000.
Annual IT-related spend (latest figure
available): £989m
Some key tasks: Modernise an IT estate that is
heavily dependent on Fujitsu "VME" mainframes dating back decades;
gaining an overview of the tax affairs of 30 million Pay As You
Earn taxpayers; clearing discrepancies in millions of tax records;
ironing out inconsistent working practices among 100,000 staff;
reducing billions of pounds of tax credit overpayments; tackle
fraud and error which auditors say is "unacceptably high". His work
so far is praised even by critics of the Revenue's cost-cutting
policies.
When joined: October 2004 on a four-year
contract
CV highlights: Graduated in mining engineering
at University College Cardiff in 1978. He became BOC's director of
global information and management user services and later became
CIO at British Gas.
Joe Harley
Title: IT director general and chief
information officer, Department for Work and Pensions
Salary: £249,000 according to the latest
figures available.
How does this compare with his boss's salary?
The permanent head of the department earned the equivalent of
£208,000.
Annual IT-related spend (latest figure
available): £1.14bn
Some key tasks: Modernise Whitehall's biggest
department in a £3bn programme that includes more than 90 IT-based
projects; manage the Customer Information System that is to become
the ID cards National Identity Register database; tackle an
estimated £2.5bn that has been lost to fraud and error, according
to John Bourn, the Comptroller and Auditor General, who has
qualified the department's accounts 18 years running. Estimated
losses have, however, been cut by £2.7bn in the past year. Bourn
said in a report published on 25 July 2007, "The department has
made real progress in introducing new systems and procedures that
both reduce fraud and error and properly value and record
identified debts." He paid tribute to the "leadership evident
within the department in tackling these issues".
When joined: July 2004 on a five-year
contract
CV highlights: Educated at the University of
Paisley. Global IT vice-president at BP, and later CIO at ICI
Paints, where he was responsible for all aspects of the global IT
function across some 50 countries.
Richard Granger
Title: Director general of NHS IT, chief
executive of NHS Connecting for Health
Salary: £270,000 to 275,000, according to the
latest figure available
How does this compare with his boss's salary?
The chief executive of the NHS earned £225,000 to £230,000.
Annual IT-related spend (latest figure available for
NHS): £1.4bn
Some key tasks: Lead the National Programme for
IT, a £12.4bn modernisation scheme for the NHS; manage contracts
with outsourcing suppliers worth £6.2bn; oversee the introduction
of systems that make it easier for hundreds of thousands of NHS
staff to improve the care and treatment of patients. Last year the
National Audit Office found that "substantial progress" had been
made on the scheme. The report commended NHS Connecting for Health
for its "tight control of the central aspects of the
programme".
When joined: 7 October 2002 (has resigned and
is due to leave by end of 2007)
CV highlights: Partner at Deloitte Consulting.
Worked on the successful procurement and delivery of a number of
large scale IT programmes including the Congestion Charging Scheme
for London.
Further reading
Comment: high salaries, high stakes for government
CIOs >>
Tony
Collins' IT projects blog >>
Computer Weekly/SSL
salary survey >>
NHS IT: worthwhile goals, debateable progress
>>
John Suffolk: can one man make a difference?
>>
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