Our staffing costs
We report our end of year staff information in an audited annual report which includes staff costs, headcount and full-time equivalent employees as at 30 June of each respective year.
The table below shows total annual staff costs for the group.
| Legacy councils | $649 million | $778 million |
| 2010/2011* | $410 million | $482 million |
| 2011/2012 | $670 million | $770 million |
| 2012/2013 | $693 million | $786 million |
| 2013/2014 | $730 million | $815 million |
| 2014/2015 | $791 million | $866 million |
| 2015/2016 | $803 million | $868 million |
| 2016/2017 | $853 million | $909 million |
| 2017/2018 | $866 million | $906 million |
| 2018/2019 | $911 million | $938 million |
| 2019/2020 | $997 million | $1,006 million |
*The 2010/2011 year covered an 8 month period from 1 November 2010 to 30 June 2011.
As at Q2 of final year at Reserve Bank of New Zealand (RBNZ) inflation calculator
Figures before 2010 excludes Ports of Auckland Limited.
Remuneration of our chief executive
Auckland Council's Chief Executive is appointed by, and accountable to, the Governing Body. The Governing Body sets his or her pay.
The current chief executive was appointed on 1 September 2020 and, as per his contractual agreement, has annual performance and remuneration reviews.
When conducting these reviews, the council's Appointments and Performance Review Committee takes a wide range of factors into account when deciding what pay level to recommend to the Governing Body, including:
- performance in the role
- external benchmarking and salary comparisons against other public sector organisations
- fiscal restraint
- the remuneration policy for all council employees.
Chief executive salary
| Doug McKay | $675,000 | November 2010 |
| Doug McKay | $750,000 | July 2011 |
| Doug McKay | $768,750 | August 2011 |
| Doug McKay | $784,125 | August 2012 |
| Doug McKay | $797,455 | August 2013 |
| Stephen Town | $630,000 | January 2014 |
| Stephen Town | $690,000 | January 2016 |
| Stephen Town | $698,000 | July 2018 |
| Jim Stabback | $600,000 | September 2020 |
Our staffing numbers
We publish two staffing figures in our annual report:
- Headcount — the Local Government Act requires us to report staff numbers as ‘headcount’, which is an employee who can work as little as a couple of hours per day.
- Full-time equivalent — we also use FTE (Full Time Equivalent), which is an employee who works the equivalent of 40 hours per week and consists of the total full-time and part-time FTEs.
The table below provides staffing levels as of 30 June for each of our reporting years.
Figures for 2010 to 2011 are provided as an approximate figure as the council was formed mid-way through the reporting year with a number of unfilled vacancies.
| Legacy councils and CCOs | Not reported | 9430 |
| 2010/2011 | Not reported | 7200 |
| 2011/2012 | 10,157 | 9111 |
| 2012/2013 | 10,757 | 9564 |
| 2013/2014 | 11,122 | 9470 |
| 2014/2015 | 11,380 | 9678 |
| 2015/2016 | 11,591 | 9870 |
| 2016/2017 | 11,893 | 10,063 |
| 2017/2018 | 11,985 | 10,259 |
| 2018/2019 | 12,538 | 10,806 |
| 2019/2020 | 12,734 | 11,083 |
Increased growth due to demand
The main contributor to increases in staff numbers over time is the significant growth of Auckland’s population.
The Auckland region has been experiencing rapid population growth, with a population of 1.4396 million in 2010 to 1.7156 million in 2021 which is around a 19 per cent growth. This large population growth increases the demands on us to provide increased levels of service.
This includes consenting, building control, and rubbish collection activities and the need to plan and build more facilities like libraries, sports fields, parks and water infrastructure.
The looming effects of climate change have also increased demands on us to future-proof the city and lead the city’s transition to a low carbon economy.
We have met these demands either within existing resources or with small staff increases. In many areas, such as in consenting, we recover the costs of additional staffing through fees and charges.
