DORSET County Council comes under a financial spotlight this week when a councillor investigates the salaries paid to its top brass.

Coun Mike Byatt wants the public to have easier access to the council’s financial details relating to jobs, salaries and allowances.

He will be asking questions at the full county council meeting tomorrow – the last before the elections in June – and wants answers on issues including how many jobs have been created at County Hall in the last five years. And he wants to know how many of those posts have a salary of £50,000 per annum or more.

Coun Byatt will also call for details of the salaries and pension entitlements paid to senior directors and the chief executive.

And he wants to know how much each councillor claims in allowances for membership of bodies including fire and police authorities.

He said: “I want this information to be in the public domain. People need to know that public money is being spent on the right things at the local government level. The council should have nothing to hide.

“It’s important to have more indians than chiefs. We need more people in touch and in direct contact with frontline services – that’s where we should spend out money.”

He said he believes directors’ salaries are at least £100,000 pa, excluding pension entitlements. And he estimates the chief executive David Jenkins receives a salary of around £130,000.

He said his call for greater transparency comes as people increasingly ask him about the council’s situation in the wake of money lost in the Icelandic bank crash.

Coun Byatt, who represents Westham and is the council’s Labour leader, said: “We have been shown to be one of the highest investors in Icelandic banks and one of the worst providers of adult social care. It’s most important that we are investing in frontline services.”

He wants it easier to find out how much councillors receive in allowan-ces. Many serve on more than one coun-cil and are also representatives on authorities that also give allowances.

He said: “Some must be receiving more than £20,000 a year. I want it to be possible for the public to see in one total what each councillor gets without having to go to each authority.”

Coun Byatt receives the members allowance of £9,500 plus around £2,700 as leader of a political group.

He said: “Times are hard and we all need to be accountable. There’s a lot of public interest in how much senior officers are receiving. This information should be publicly available.”

A county council spokesman said Coun Byatt would receive answers to his questions during the meeting.