CITY councillors are now the lowest-paid in south Worcestershire, your Worcester News can reveal.

Worcester City Council’s decision to freeze councillors’ allowances for the current year has left its members notably worse-off than their counterparts at Wychavon and Malvern Hills district councils, who both awarded themselves inflation-busting pay rises of more than nine per cent this year.

Over at County Hall, members of Worcestershire County Council received a 2.5 per cent increase, in line with inflation levels at the beginning of the year.

Local councillors’ pay rises are recommended each year by a panel of community leaders called the Independent Remuneration Panel (IRP). However, the final decision on pay still lies with each individual council.

This year’s pay rises at Wychavon, Malvern Hills and the county were all in line with the panel’s recommendations. Only Worcester bucked the trend by ignoring the panel and not increasing councillors’ pay at all.

Worcester’s Tory leader Simon Geraghty said: “It came down to the fact that members were aware of the financial situation we are in as a council. Rather than go with the panel’s recommendation we decided to freeze payments this year, which in real terms is a pay cut – particularly with inflation now running at about four per cent.”

Coun Geraghty praised his fellow councillors for the work they do for relatively little financial reward.

“I genuinely believe the citizens of Worcester get good value for money out of all their councillors,” he said.

Four city councillors – Coun Geraghty, his Conservative colleague Derek Prodger, Labour’s Jo Hodges and Liberal Democrat Sue Askin - are also members of the county council and are therefore eligible to claim allowances from both.

Just over half (29) of the 57 members of the county council also work as district councillors.

The deputy leader of Malvern Hills, Ralph Madden, defended his council’s decision to award its members a 9.3 per cent pay rise.

He said: "An independent body recommends the financial allowances councillors should receive.

“This year the council felt it should implement the increases suggested by the IRP in order to bring them closer to the level of other councils in south Worcestershire.

The decision was made in recognition of the fact that councillors work long hours on behalf of the residents they represent.”