This article was updated to reflect the fact that on Wednesday 15 May at 2:30pm, Tesco contacted the Canary claiming that “Ken does pay UK tax on his Tesco earnings” – contrary to the Evening Standard story saying he doesn’t.
Tesco has caused uproar after it announced its boss’s huge salary – which is around 447 times greater than it’s lowest-paid worker. It comes as the supermarket giant is also ripping off farmers, and being a dick about how charities can collect its unsold food.
Tesco: eye-watering payrise for CEO
Ken Murphy, who took over as chief executive of the UK’s largest supermarket group in October 2020, was paid £4.7m in salary and bonuses in the year to February.
The rest came from shares that were awarded to Mr Murphy when he joined and paid out this year after he surpassed a number of performance targets.
For the coming year, Mr Murphy’s basic salary will be increased by 3%, which Tesco said was below a raise for its UK hourly-paid colleagues.
The company said: “When considering base salary increases for our senior executives, the committee continues to be mindful of both the wider colleague experience and our fairness principles.”
Tesco staff earn £12.02 or £13.15 an hour, depending on where they work.
Murphy’s £4.4m pay rise from the year before means his pay is 447 times greater than a full time Tesco worker at the lower quartile of the workforce and 431 times greater than the median Tesco employee.
Capitalism on steroids
Of course, his huge pay packet is also at the expense of struggling working-class people. As one person on X pointed out:
Tesco CEO collected £9.9m pay packet, doubled from last year.
Profits up 159%, cause cost of living crisis.
Most Tesco workers are at/around the minimum wage. Many rely on food banks, universal credit.
Let workers vote on exec pay. Levy windfall taxes.https://t.co/AR50faMhEC
— Prem Sikka (@premnsikka) May 15, 2024
The supermarket giant is also ripping off farmers:
Tesco made a £2.3bn profit last year while 49% of fruit and veg farmers fear they’ll be out of business before the end of this year.
Tesco are paying unfair prices to farmers, selling at unfair prices to consumers and posting record profits – all during a cost of living crisis.
— No Farmers, No Food (@NoFarmsNoFoods) May 15, 2024
Moreover, Tesco is also now restricting when charities can collect unsold food from it:
Tesco is facing criticism from “shocked” charities who say they are struggling to distribute unwanted food to homeless and hungry people after they claim the retailer brought in rules that mean unwanted food can only be collected in the evening… https://t.co/jbHT2maDx6
— Streets Kitchen (@streetskitchen) May 14, 2024
Tesco: every little helps… us
Luke Hildyard, executive director of the High Pay Centre, highlighted the extreme disparity between the CEO’s pay and the pay of the supermarket giant’s workers.
This is the third highest gap between the CEO of any firm and their typical employee recorded since pay ratio reporting began five years ago.
You couldn’t really get a better indicator of how the UK economy serves the interests of the super rich at the expense of everybody else than this – a multi-millionaire chief executive trousering another £10 million while their customers endure major price rises and their employees have to get by on less than a quarter of a percent of what the CEO takes home.
Just to top this whole story off, Murphy reportedly wasn’t previously even paying tax in the UK – as in 2023 the Standard reported he was non-dommed to the Republic of Ireland. However, Tesco contacted the Canary claiming:
The claim that Ken does not pay tax in the UK is incorrect. Ken does pay UK tax on his Tesco earnings
Every little fucking helps if you’re a millionaire CEO, hey? Sadly the same doesn’t apply for the rest of us – despite Tesco’s claims.
Featured image supplied
