A trio of recruits to the senior management team at the new North Sea oil and gas industry regulator are poised to join the ranks of the UK’s best-paid civil servants.
Their salaries and those of existing members of the Oil and Gas Authority’s executive lineup has prompted concern about excessive pay.
The recently launched OGA is offering £150,000-plus salaries for the people it needs to fill three top level posts.
Two of the vacancies are in Aberdeen, with the Granite City-based regulator seeking a director for offshore exploration and production and another for technology and projects to join its top team.
The pair will earn around £165,000 a year, while a London-based director of policy, performance and economics will be paid about £150,000.
It means the OGA’s top team join the ranks of Britain’s best-paid public servants, many of them earning more than the £142,000 salary of Prime Minister David Cameron.
OGA is also advertising four other manager posts, two based in Aberdeen, one in London and one in either Aberdeen or London, at salaries of about £100,000.
Chief executive Andy Samuel is on £280,000 a year, which could be topped up with a further £50,000 performance-related bonus, and three recent recruits to the OGA executive lineup are on packages similar to the trio of directors coming in to join them.
By oil and gas industry standards the pay levels are not outlandish but they have attracted some attention in light of a downturn in the sector.
Scottish Trades Union Congress assistant secretary Stephen Boyd said: “The Oil and Gas Authority is simply out of touch with reality.
“It has clearly taken no cognisance whatsoever of current challenges in the oil and gas sector or the stinging wage restraint being imposed on the rest of the public sector when it agreed to pay these outrageous salaries.
“It’s ridiculous to pretend salaries at this level are necessary to be competitive when senior people are being made redundant across the sector. The OGA needs to reconsider and quickly”.
The OGA will formally become an executive agency on April 5 but will change to a UK Government-owned company by the summer of 2016.
Earlier this month, Mr Samuel named the first three of a six-strong management team to support him as he starts building up the new regulatory body.
Announcing the latest recruitment drive, he said: “The recent decline in the global oil price has magnified the challenges facing the UK oil and gas industry.
“The successful candidates for these exciting roles will have a unique opportunity to develop and implement new oil and gas strategies.”
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