I READ with interest that a council officer is to be paid almost £3,000 per week. Clearly this is well above the national minimum wage rate of £6.31 per hour.

I am pleased that the council does at least satisfy this aspect of the employment regulations and expect that expenses and pension benefits have been similarly satisfactorily covered.

I find it difficult to believe it can be considered good value for money to add on to an inflated council pay bill of £141,000 per year for the Director of Public Health and Chief Executive of £137,000 per year, to name but a few of these high earners, a further £156,000 per year for a council officer to see through a controversial plan through the planning stage.

The council is supposedly on a tight budget and there is high unemployment in the city, people in poverty, cut-backs in welfare benefits and food banks. The temerity of the Council to offer this pay rate is an affront to common sense and hard-pressed council taxpayers of a city where the average annual salary is less than £30,000.

Who ever authorised this should really take a second look and perhaps consider what happened to Louis XV1, the populace I declare is not prepared to “eat cake”

Keith Wareham, Linton Road, Nether Poppleton, York.