Information about our staff

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.

*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

Remuneration of our employees

Salary levels for our employees are set through a clear and transparent process. They are benchmarked against comparable public sector organisations and market rates. 

Positions that are similar are banded and grouped together in one of 15 salary bands (A-O). This ensures equity and fairness by paying similar roles in a similar way.

Council-controlled organisations (CCOs) have individual approaches to employee remuneration, increases, diversity and inclusion.

How we set annual remuneration increases

Each year we enter negotiations with the Public Service Association (PSA) to decide the annual pay increase for everyone (union member or not) whose role is covered under the Auckland Council – Public Service Association Collective Agreement | Te Whakaaetanga Tōpū a Te Kaunihera o Tāmaki Makaurau – Te Pūkenga Here Tikanga Mahi.

The outcome of this process also affects staff whose roles are covered by other collective agreements.

The PSA and Auckland Council

We are committed to working together for an outcome that:

• is fair to all our people
• reflects our strategic goals
• is affordable and sustainable
• strengthens our partnership with the PSA.

There is a contractual commitment that the increase will be at least the Consumer Price Index (CPI) rate as recorded in the previous December quarter. 

Diversity and inclusion

We are committed to an inclusive workplace that celebrates and values the diverse voices, specialist knowledge and lived experiences of employees. We are working towards an employee profile that reflects the diverse communities of Tāmaki Makaurau.

We support this commitment through recruitment and retention strategies such as our MAHI Māori employment strategy, our Ara Moana Pasifika strategy, understanding and addressing gender and ethnicity pay gaps and providing support networks for employees — such as our networks for disability, women, Muslim, and Rainbow employees.

Gender and ethnicity pay gaps

We believe everyone should be paid fairly regardless of ethnicity, gender or ability.

Our pay gaps

Our pay gaps as of 1 March 2023 are:

We pay gender and ethnicity groups equally for the work they do.

However, these groups are unevenly represented across jobs and organisational levels at Auckland Council.

To address this, we plan to monitor, track and improve our pay gaps by:

• having diverse interview panels
• working with staff support networks to create and review policies that support our staff and promote belonging
• implementing leadership development strategies that attract and retain talented people who represent the diversity of Auckland at all levels of our organisation.

Living wage

Auckland Council adopted the living wage for employees in 2017. This was extended to contractors in 2019.

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.

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.