What cost of living crisis? Bumper executive bonuses make a comeback

As staff grapple with rising food and petrol prices, average pay of FTSE 100 bosses has risen to pre-Covid levels

If that had been our CEO, he would've been on the front pages with whiskers painted on him and labelled a greedy fat cat," remarked the executive, chewing on a roasted scallop in a busy north London restaurant. The diner works at an energy supplier and has just seen the thumping 6.5m handed out to John Pettigrew, boss of National Grid, the privately owned national electricity operator.

Pettigrew's job in charge of a low-profile, non-customer facing infrastructure business perhaps spared him from scrutiny. But it is AGM season, when executive pay deals are published and put to a vote by shareholders, and there will doubtless be others who become an emblem of corporate largesse as worker discontent deepens in the coming months.