An online petition demanding that Tory councillors reverse the decision to significantly increase their allowances has been launched on Surrey County Council’s website.

Richard Wilson, Labour’s prospective parliamentary candidate for Guildford, has started the petition, which calls on councillors to "return the massive unacceptable pay rises awarded to leading councillors".

On May 6, Conservative-led Surrey County Council (SCC) considered recommendations for changes to the basic and special responsibility allowances paid to councillors, which were last increased in July 2010.

An Independent Remuneration Panel (IRP) recommended that the special allowance paid to the leader of the council be increased from £27,000 to £35,548.  The Conservative councillors bumped this up to £43,000.

They also voted to increase the deputy leader’s special allowance from £19,500 to £31,250 - even though the IRP had recommended a rise to £30,333.

The changes take the allowances paid to the leader of the council up to £55,418 - a more than 60 per cent increase.

The petition is the latest in a series of protests against the huge allowances increase.

Last Monday, all three members of the IRP resigned in protest over councillors’ "flagrant disregard" for the recommendations it had made.

And by the end of last week, Councillor Hazel Watson, leader of the Liberal Democrats on SCC, said she had written to Eric Pickles, Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government, asking him to investigate the way in which the decisions were taken at the meeting and whether they complied with Government regulations.

Mr Wilson said: "This petition is an ideal method for angry Surrey council taxpayers to express how they feel.

"I am not trying to make political capital from this petition.  In fact, I have written to all the councillors who opposed the pay hike to invite them to sign the petition.

"To show this is a cross-party issue I have also invited my UKIP and Lib Dem opponents to show they oppose it too."

"Surrey County Council recently voted not to pay all its employees a living wage.

"By ignoring independent advice and grabbing this much taxpayers’ money for himself and his appointees, Councillor Hodge has shown he is totally out of touch with the electorate.

"I call on Councillor Hodge to return the allowances to the previous level and consider his position on the council."

On the councillors voting themselves increases in their allowances, Brandon Lewis, Local Government Minister, said: "Given rank-and-file local government staff have gone through a pay freeze and been offered a one per cent pay rise this year, then councillors need to lead by example too.

"Ministers have done this - by cutting ministerial salaries in 2010 and freezing them for the rest of this Parliament.

"There can be little excuse for a council refusing to freeze council tax on grounds it has no money, but then using taxpayers’ cash to hike up the overall cost of councillors."

A spokesman for the Conservative group of councillors on SCC, said: "SCC has a well-established process for receiving petitions.

"This decision was made because many of these roles equate to a full-time job, particularly in light of the additional duties handed down from central Government, and in order to attract a wide-range of people with diverse backgrounds, it is vital that the remuneration is at an appropriate level."

After two days, the petition has attracted 90 signatures.

To sign the petition click here.

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