THE "FAT CAT" obscenity goes on - as bosses at North West-based power and water giant United Utilities stick their noses deep into the pay trough.

Up goes the salary of chief executive Brian Staples by a thumping 27 per cent to £300,000. Chairman Sir Desmond Pitcher nets a 24 per cent rise as his pay reaches £310,000. And the rest of the board get increases of 13 and 11 per cent.

The excuse for these whopping rises is that they are in line with the extra responsibilities the bosses assumed after North West Water bought Norweb.

Extra greed, more like.

However, if neither shareholders nor government will curb this excess then the companies involved are riding for a fall.

For it is not just the insulting size of these pay rises, but also the curbs that their recipients impose on their employees' pay, that has built up a huge fund of political ill will towards the once-public utilities and which may yet earn them a deserved windfall tax raid on their profits.

Shareholders at least should heed that threat when they let allow these fat cats chiefs so much rein - for, rightly, the fed-up customers, as voters, will not.

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