A decision on whether to increase the amount of money that Middlesbrough councillors receive has been deferred for a month.
The decision to delay was welcomed by most councillors who attended the full meeting of Middlesbrough Council on Wednesday 10 September, and what was anticipated to be a heated debate didn’t end up materialising.
The recommendations made (by an independent panel) were for an increase of £1,391 to the basic allowance, provided to all 46 councillors and the elected mayor, while special responsibility allowances would remain frozen. Even if this proposal had been adopted, councillors in the town would still be the second-worst off out of the five local authorities in the Tees Valley.
As well as lagging behind other local authorities in terms of money provided to councillors, the other main reason highlighted for increasing allowances was because at the current (comparatively low) level, a wide demographic may be discouraged from standing for council.
On the other hand, numerous councillors had said prior to the meeting that they would not vote for an increase in their allowance. This stance was taken for a variety of reasons, which included highlighting how the town is struggling financially, so it would be wrong for councillors to be better off at this time.
At the meeting, monitoring officer Charlotte Benjamin said the council is legally required to publish a scheme of allowances for members each year, “which describes the amounts that members receive in connection with their work”, she explained. The Independent Panel on Members’ Remuneration makes recommendations for what they think these figures should be.
As has been reported, the basic annual allowance for councillors in Middlesbrough is lower than any other local authority in the Tees Valley, at £7,608 (the next lowest figure is in Hartlepool, where councillors are entitled to £8,330 in a year). The highest paid councillors in the Tees Valley are in neighbouring Redcar & Cleveland, with 2025 figures showing that councillors are in receipt of £10,527. Meanwhile the North East average basic allowance for councillors is £11,127 in 2025.
Councillors were due to be voting at Wednesday’s meeting whether they were going to accept the recommendations of the independent panel, which would have seen the basic allowance increase to the Teesside average of £8,999. They also had the option to not accept the recommendation, meaning the current scheme (£7,608 remuneration) will run on and be republished unless and until members want to use the independent panel’s recommendations as a “jumping off point” and councillors could consider their own scheme, in the words of Ms Benjamin.
If councillors had agreed to the recommendations, this would have increased the council’s total basic allowance spending from £357,576 to £422,953 – an increase of £65,377. It should be noted that the panel acts independently from the council and neither council officers nor elected members have any influence.
MICA Councillor Ian Morrish asked for the debate and vote to be deferred until the following meeting (due to take place on 15 October). He explained that such a deferral would allow members to have a briefing from officers on the rationale and implications of the proposals.
The motion was seconded by Labour Councillor Edward Clynch and cross-party support for this course of action was clear in the vote, with the vast majority of members voting in favour of the deferral.
