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Reader poll reveals ‘no’ to £25k-a-year councillor role – but did as many reject idea as you might think?

We asked readers if they would take on the role of a local councillor for a basic salary which has just seen around £5,000, or more, added to the wage packet of elected representatives.

Councillor salaries have just gone up by as much as 40% following an independent review. Image: DC Thomson
Councillor salaries have just gone up by as much as 40% following an independent review. Image: DC Thomson

Could a pay bump bring an injection of new blood into our local councils?

This week has seen energy cost increases and Courier country council tax rises of up to 11% take effect.

It also saw up as much as 40% – almost £15,000 – added to the pay packets of our local elected representatives.

Basic pay for councillors jumped around 20% to near the £25,000 mark.

Councillors don’t set their own pay and the latest Scotland-wide increases were approved by Holyrood last year.

So we asked readers: would they do the job for that wage?

There were 125 responses.

For the majority, it was a firm ‘no’.

But the 56% figure was perhaps not the landslide against the idea many might have expected.

Especially when its seems being a councillor is considered a thankless task.

Readers have their say on councillor role

Alongside our poll, readers set out their thoughts on whether our current crop of councillors is value for money – and whether they’d take it on.

Violet wrote: “There are councillors worth that salary and more, and there are others who are not.

“I don’t think there are many residents who would want to take on the thankless task. “Maybe some of those who are never happy with what the council do should stand for election.”

POV100 said: “A newly-qualified nurse earns less than £25k per annum. They will also have spent years studying and will have student loans to pay off.

“A councillor doesn’t work long shifts and have anything like the responsibility that our nurses accept as part of their jobs. So no – councillors shouldn’t be paid any more than a junior nurse.

“Perhaps if councillors demonstrated even some of the commitment to serve the public in the way that nurses do then they may earn more respect.”

There was also a suggestion the role should return to its unpaid origins.

Liz commented: “They chose the path. Maybe because they are able to set their own salaries when in government.

“You also have to remember the expenses they are able to claim.

“Get back to when local councillors did it for their community and never got paid.”

But Violet responded: “I don’t think you’d get many residents willing to take on the role of councillor without pay.

“Not only is it a huge commitment (if you take the role as seriously as it should be taken), but the constant abuse, no matter whether representing a political party or independent, would see to that.”

No longer a retirement role?

Ways of attracting new blood into the role has long been a dilemma for every local authority.

Squatter Madras suggested one approach.

“Definitely ban retired folk from being councillors,” they said.

“They are the present and the past, they’ve had their time.

“We need forward-looking present and future younger councillors, it’s their time now.”

Conversation