A COUNCILLOR is being paid nearly £8,000 a year to represent York taxpayers on a waste management board, but has never had to declare the sum.

Cllr Ann Reid said she was appointed last August to represent City of York Council on the board of Yorwaste, which pays her an annual fee of £7,719.

She said: “I attend 12 board meetings a year, as well as audit committee meetings, and, along with my fellow board members, I have a clear role to play in ensuring the board provides strong corporate governance and to challenge the executive team running the business."

The Dringhouses and Woodthorpe councillor said the business had legal responsibilities, which meant all board members had personal liabilities and it was common practice for board members to be paid for holding such responsibilities.

She said directors’ fees were declared in Yorwaste accounts filed at Companies House but she did not declare her remuneration on the council’s website - along with her basic council allowance of £8,667 and Special Responsibility Allowance of £7,800 for chairing planning - because she was not obliged to, as it was paid by Yorwaste and not by the council.

This was confirmed by a council spokeswoman. But governance campaigner Gwen Swinburn, who heard about the payment but could find no record of it in the council’s accounts, said she believed it should be declared in some way ‘in the interests of transparency and openness.’

She also said she did not understand why Cllr Reid had ‘pocketed’ this money when other councillors who were directors of other businesses, such as Make it York or Veritau, received no additional payment.

Cllr Reid said Yorwaste was very different, as it was a commercial organisation which would hopefully pay a dividend back to the council as a minority shareholder.

She said she would discuss with the council andYorwaste's board the best way of increasing transparency,’ without either disclosing commercial information to competitors or confusing the situation as to the source of the payments.