Golden goodbyes
Nine top officials in government departments or its agencies have walked away with pay offs of £250,000 or more.
A Fact Service analysis of the 2012-13 annual reports shows that the Ministry of Justice (MoJ) or its agencies gave a golden goodbye of between £300,000 and £350,000 to one person, while another three people received between £250,000 and £300,000 each.
There were five other payments of between £250,000 and £300,000 in compensation to one official at each of the following departments or agencies: Treasury Solicitor’s Office; Foreign and Commonwealth Office; Cabinet Office, Department for Energy and Climate Change; and the Home Office.
There is no transparency in the accounts as to who received such amounts. However, the National Offender Management Service, one of the MoJ’s executive agencies, reported separately that Steve Wagstaffe, the former director of Public Sector Prisons had left during the financial year under the voluntary early departure scheme.
He received “a voluntary exit payment” of between £175,000 and £180,000; add in pension payments and he would appear to be the likely recipient of the payment detailed in the MoJ’s accounts.
In September, Fact Service reported on the huge pay-off to Mike Yates of the Crown Prosecution Service (see issue 38).
Any reader wanting to check a particular department should go to www.gov.uk and put annual report and accounts into the search engine.