Pay report soft on fat cats, say critics

This article was published in The Age 1 October 2009

A report proposing new controls over executive salaries has been blasted by unions and other critics as ineffectual, and a licence for continued greed.

The report, by the Productivity Commission, has recommended giving shareholders of public companies more power over executive pay, but rejected the idea of capping salaries.

Outlining his recommendations, commission chairman Gary Banks argued there had been no 'general failure' in Australia's system for regulating executive pay, despite some egregious cases.

But, he said, there had been excesses that warranted Government action, after top chief executive salaries had more than tripled since 1993. ''Greed is obviously an issue and is perhaps a fact of life''.