Senior IT officials among top paid civil servants

Seven senior IT officials are on the newly published list of top paid civil servants.

In the list published by the government to provide greater transparency of high earners' salaries, Joe Harley, IT director general and chief information officer (CIO) at the Department for Work and Pensions, comes out top of the information specialists.

His salary of £245,000-£249,999 places him third on the overall list, behind John Fingleton, chief executive of the Office of Fair Trading on £275,000-279,999, and David Nicholson, chief executive of the NHS, on £255,000-259,999.

Among the other IT officials, John Suffolk comes second to Harley. He is paid £205,000-£209,999 in his role as chair of the Chief Information Officers' Council and the government's CIO, leading the formulation of ICT policy across Whitehall.

On the same salary is Christine Connelly, CIO at the Department of Health and responsible for the NHS National Programme for IT. Martin Bellamy ICT director at the Department of Health gets £160,000-£164,999.

Others on the list are: Phil Pavitt, who as CIO for HM Revenue and Customs earns £180,000-£184,999; Andy Nelson, CIO at the Ministry of Justice (MoJ), with £190,000-£194,999; and Nick Ramsay, the MoJ's director ICT portfolio and programmes, with £160,000-£164,999.

The government has published the salaries of the highest paid civil servants in what it has described as a "radical shake-up of government transparency". It has released the name, job title, grade and salary level of senior civil servants across Whitehall with salaries of more than £150,000, making some of this information public for the first time.

The publication has been overseen by Francis Maude, minister for the Cabinet Office.

"Today is just the start of what we plan to do," said Maude. "We are determined to set an example for the wider public sector, and to create a 'right to data' as a core part of government business."

The Public Sector Transparency Board, made up of external experts and data users, and public sector data specialists will support public sector bodies in implementing transparency and open data.

This article was originally published at Kable.

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