M&S boss Steve Rowe's monstrous pay package should surprise no one given the backgrounds of the people that set it

If you want an example of how Britain is a country that works wonderfully well for the few, M&S has just provided one.

It’s hardly a secret that the retailer is struggling. One of the measures taken to address that by recently appointed boss Steve Rowe is the announcement of a store closure programme, as part of a move to focus the retailer’s business on food.

As if that wasn’t bad enough for the retailer’s staff, M&S is imposing a new contract. While workers’ hourly rates of pay will be raised, premiums for unsociable hours such as working Sundays are being cut. There is a compensation package on offer, but the Union of Shop, Distributive and Allied Workers (Usdaw) says it won't fill the gap and is only available to those that meet a deadline to sign the new contract.

M&S says no worker “need be worse off”. Usdaw, already unhappy with what it says is a lack of engagement on the part of the company, thinks otherwise. It says up to half of the retailer's staff will lose out, with long serving, loyal employees the worst hit. Usdaw calls the situation as “a disgrace”.

Indeed so, particularly given the fact that it is against that backdrop that a £1.8m share-based incentive package handed to chief executive Steve Rowe has emerged.

This could take his total annual pay to a staggering £4.2m, if he hits sales and profitability targets. It’s to incentivise him, you see, along with other top bosses who stand to make similar, if slightly less grandiose, sums.

Now, here’s the thing. Increasing sales at M&S, and enhancing the profits from those sales, is what Rowe was hired to do. That’s his job. For doing that job he will be paid extraordinarily well, with a basic annual salary of £810,000, plus a string of benefits.

Quite why he should need any further incentives beyond that is beyond me, and probably beyond most of the people that just about get by on their M&S salaries.

Most people would put in herculean efforts were they to be offered even half Rowe’s basic salary. A quarter, even. I know I would. Most people would be thinking about ways to improve sales and profits morning, noon and night with the aim of keeping their hands on such a pot of gold.

Yet when executives reach the exalted level of Rowe, an annual salary that pays more than many Britons will earn in a lifetime, doesn’t seem to do it.

So Rowe also has a bonus that could pay him up to 200 per cent of his basic package in addition to that appalling £1.8m.

Its emergence at a time when workers are seeing their pay packages cut, when they’re not being laid off, is downright insulting. A veritable kick in the teeth.

The remuneration committee that put this monstrosity together appears not to have given any consideration to the fact that not only is this an appalling bit of PR. It’s also potentially bad for business.

How would you feel about getting up for work in the morning in the knowledge that your pay was being cut while the boss was making millions in the process of skewering you? Not good, I’d imagine. You’d certainly be unlikely to go the extra mile, which is something that, despite the struggles of this business, M&S staff have usually done. If they hadn’t, it would be in far worse shape than it is.

If you take a look at the backgrounds of the members of the company’s pay setting remuneration committee, you will see why that wasn’t considered.

It is chaired by Vindi Banga, a former Unilever executive turned private equity mogul. Then there’s Miranda Curtis, a former Liberty executive turned serial non-executive director. Richard Solomons is a former investment banker who later became finance director at Bass, later Six Continents. Robert Swannell, who also serves as M&S chairman, is another one time investment banker. He also works for the Government, as the chair of UK Government Investments.

These people are all among Britain’s business elite. They will, therefore, all have benefitted from a rotten system at some point. They are the few for whom modern Britain is set up.

To them, the average worker is no more than a number on a spreadsheet, a commodity that can be easily replaced, but the CEO is a superstar who has to be cuddled and cosseted, which completely ignores the fact that business is a team sport and businesses work best when all the members of the team are pulling together.

Theresa May has promised to change this. But she soon backtracked on her pledge to put workers on boards, and with people like Swannell whispering in the ears of ministers and civil servants, is it any wonder? Don’t be surprised if we are treated to further backtracking in the months ahead. Swannell and his friends have no interest in change. Quite the reverse.