Daily Express: What a waste of your money

by Adrian Lee

They squander billions of pounds running public bodies to which many are appointed because they are Government cronies.<$><$>We reveal the scandalous spending of the quango kings and queens

TREVOR PHILLIPS set to work as soon as he got his feet under the table at his plush Thames-side office. The new chairman of the Commission for Equality and Human Rights decided that the name simply did not project the right image.

From now on it would be known as the Equality and Human Rights Commission.

Sitting at his desk, on which a bust of Lenin is proudly displayed, the former TV executive, on a reported £160,000 a year, admitted that the change was "trivial" but better emphasised the role of the organisation. Quango watchers claim the switch cost the taxpayer tens of thousands of pounds from the Commission's annual £70million budget as stationery and other branding was thrown on the tip.

Now the shambolic launch that Phillips presided over last month has put such organisations, and those who run them, under the spotlight.

While his background and experience in human rights might, at first glance, appear to make Phillips a perfect candidate to fill the handsomely paid post, his links with New Labour have inevitably raised eyebrows – Peter Mandelson, once one of Tony Blair's closest colleagues, was best man at his wedding.

It is claimed that cronyism is at the heart of key appointments to many of Britain's 900 quangos – semiautonomous organisations funded by the Government and, indirectly, by the taxpayer. Opponents insist that many are a colossal waste of money, paying fat cat salaries to undeserving friends of the Labour Party. The most sought-after positions offer generous perks, bonuses and curtailed working weeks which allow the lucky few to take on other lucrative roles.

It has been calculated that the total bill for running the UK's quangoes is £175billion – more than £2,000 for every taxpayer in the country. It is hardly surprising when inflationbusting pay rises are the order of the day for quango chiefs. There are also some tempting perks, including excellent pension deals.

An analysis shows that Labour supporters are four times more likely to be placed, unelected, on to quangos than their Conservative counterparts.

So, who are the kings and queens of the quangos? Another Labour crony is Baroness Young of Old Scone, chief executive of the Environment Agency, responsible for flood protection. Last summer homeowners were left with a £5billion clean-up bill after rivers breached barriers or poured through non-existent defences.

Lady Young, 59, toured the country in her waders expressing sympathy.

But her words began sounding increasingly hollow when it emerged that she had been awarded a £24,000 "performance bonus" on top of her £163,000 salary.

One of the worst moments for the agency came when its mobile flood defence barriers got stuck in traffic on the way to Upton-on-Severn in Worcestershire, later overwhelmed by the rising waters. A Commons committee said the poor quality of many flood defences was an indictment of Lady Young's seven years at the quango. However, she ignored calls to resign or pay back her bonus.

Her Labour colleague Baroness Henig, 64, receives £64,800 a year for a three-day week chairing the Security Industry Authority, a Home Office quango overseeing licensing for nightclub bouncers and private security guards. Her first husband was a Labour MP and she has homes in Lancashire and London.

John Woodward, chief executive of the UK Film Council, whose salary leapt by more than 13 per cent to £230,000, is also entitled to free cinema tickets worth £250 per year and £100 towards membership of a gym. His salary works out at £126 an hour – compared with just £12 for a nurse and £8 for a soldier.

As Peter Hendy commutes from his imposing home in Bath, the Transport for London commissioner can take comfort in subsidised rail travel and a free Oyster card for the London Underground. Hendy is a former bus driver and conductor who rose through the ranks to head London's public transport system, having become a multi-millionaire from bus privatisation. Last year he earned £435,000, including a performance bonus of £115,000, at a time when the capital's transport network was frequently in chaos.

In 1995 Gordon Brown, then Shadow Chancellor, promised "a bonfire of the quangos and greater democracy". In fact their numbers continued to soar after Labour came to power two years later. And since replacing Tony Blair as Prime Minister, Brown has wasted no time in creating new quangos. He is currently under attack for ordering nine more, costing £2.4billion.

AREPORT last year exposed 20 friends and allies of Tony Blair who earned up to £300,000 each a year from jobs handed out by the Government. It also revealed a merry-go-round of the same people moving from quango to quango.

At the time Sir Ronald Cohen, an entrepreneur with a personal fortune estimated at £260million, held six posts, including chairman of the Social Development Task Force. In the past he has donated more than £1.8million to the Labour Party.

Fellow donor Chai Patel, who gave £100,000 and loaned £1.5million in 2005, was serving on six, including the obscure Better Regulation Task Force. Patel, former owner of the Priory clinics group, has been described as New Labour's health guru. Lord Warner, 67, who quit as health minister last year saying he wanted to spend more time with his family, picks up £30,000 a year for one and a half days a week chairing an NHS quango.

The award of the 2012 Olympic Games to London is also providing rich pickings. There is no suggestion that he has political affiliations but David Higgins, 52, chief executive of the Olympic Delivery Authority, receives £631,000 a year – or £347 an hour.

"On his watch the budget for the Olympics has spiralled, " says Corin Taylor, head of research for the Taxpayers' Alliance. "It has multiplied four-fold to more than £9billion. These are people who have failed spectacularly. Costs have exploded yet they are still receiving bonuses totalling £500,000." Each London council tax payer will fork out 38p a week for the next 12 years under the funding deal for the Games. As the costs threaten to run out of control, some critics claim that Lottery and other public funds will also have to be raided.

Taylor adds: "Big questions must be asked about quangos and those who run them. We know there are people in cushy jobs, turning up for half the week, and there is a feeling that they are shoved there in return for political favours or donations.

Many of them are earning more than the Prime Minister." Quangos are notoriously inefficient. Staff at two of Britain's biggest – the Driving Standards Agency and the Driver and Vehicle Licensing Agency (DVLA) – are taking twice as many sick days as workers in the private sector. Then, at the Learning and Skills Council, which funds further education and training outside universities, more than £100million has been spent in the past six years on redundancies and four separate reorganisations. Chief executive Mark Haysom, a former managing director for a newspaper group, has a £269,000 salary package.

Dan Lewis, author of the Essential Guide to British Quangos and research director of the Economic Research Council, says: "The private sector could do a better job.

Too often the Government's solution is to set up a quango with a great-sounding name." Many also favour high-cost London bases.

Mike Denham, a former Treasury civil servant who has investigated the role of quangos, says: "There are far too many, wasting an awful lot of taxpayers' money." It is feared that if Gordon Brown wins the next general election with a vastly reduced majority, there will be a huge scramble by displaced Labour MPs to get on board the quango gravy train.

Clearly, for all the Prime Minister's rhetoric before Labour came to power, the quango is alive and thriving. As Dan Lewis remarks, Mr Brown's pledge to light a bonfire of the quangos turned out to be a few smouldering twigs. And we are all paying for it.