CHORLEY'S councillors were set to give themselves a pay rise this week.

Their allowances for attending meetings and carrying out other duties were reviewed by the borough's management and finance committee on Tuesday evening.

It considered three options - including a proposed increase to be phased in over the next three years which the council said would "slowly bring councillors in line with many of their counterparts across England and Wales." The authority defended the proposals - which will eventually cost a total of £71,543 if they are agreed - by pointing out that across the country as a whole councillors' allowances rose by 37 per cent last year while Chorley councillors received a rise of just 2.5 per cent despite spending more time on council business.

Using information produced by an all party working group of the local authority associations which met in April 1995, council chiefs aim to link councillors' allowances to the average national white collar daily wage rate, currently standing at £91.24 per day.

The current basic allowance for Chorley councillors is equivalent to 15 days' work per annum based on that rate.

But a report before the committee said: "Bearing in mind that each member attends an average of 55 meetings a year and also spends a considerable amount of time on ward duties, travelling, telephone calls etc, this figure is inadequate."

If the three-year option is introduced, the basic yearly allowance for a councillor would rise from £1,379 to £1,620 from September, to £1,996 in year two and to £2,372 in the third year.

Council leader John Wilson said: "There should be no reason that people are put off from being councillors because it would mean they lose out financially."

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