ICI chief paid £1m despite plunge in shares

Brendan O'Neill, the chief executive of ICI, earned more than £1m in 2002 during a year that saw shares in the chemicals giant plunge by around a third.

The company's report and accounts reveal Mr O'Neill's total pay was £1.02m in 2002, an increase from £774,000 the year before. Over the same year, shares in ICI plunged from about 350p each to about 240p.

The stock has since registered further losses and closed last night at 141.5p. Mr O'Neill earned a £615,000 salary in 2002 as well as an incentive payment of £361,000 and other benefits totalling £39,000.

Elsewhere, Luqman Arnold, chief executive of Abbey National, received £232,000 in salary and bonus for working only two months of last year. The package was still less than a sixth of the £1.7m payout to the bank's former boss, Ian Harley, who was forced to step down in July.

Mr Arnold, who joined Abbey in October, is on a £675,000 salary while Stephen Hester, the finance director, is being paid £465,000 in basic remuneration. As Mr Hester joined in May, he received £623,000 in salary and bonus for 2002. Meanwhile, Eric Daniels, head of retail banking at Lloyds TSB, earned £1.26m last year – almost half a million pounds more than the bank's chief executive, Peter Ellwood.

Mr Daniels, who takes over from Mr Ellwood in May, was paid a £450,000-a-year salary plus £349,000 of other benefits, including allowances for relocation, housing and legal advice, and a £450,000 fixed bonus. That £450,000 bonus had been guaranteed as part of Mr Daniels' recruitment to the bank, a spokesperson said last night, adding it was "what was needed" to recruit "someone of his calibre".

Mr Ellwood, who is retiring, earned £733,000 last year, down from £1m the year before, comprising a £660,000 salary, other benefits of £22,000 and a bonus of £31,000.