Sir Martin Sorrell defends his £70m pay package

Advertising guru Sir Martin Sorrell has been forced to defend his large pay package, saying he is worth every penny.

The founder of advertising giant WPP is facing a backlash from shareholders over his probable total remuneration of more than £70m this year, which is thought to be the second-largest ever earned by the chief executive of a large company in the UK.

The total package is made up of a £1.15m salary, a share award of £63m - which may rise to £70m, when the rest of the financial year is added - and an undisclosed cash bonus on top, says The Independent.

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Speaking at an advertising conference in London yesterday, Sorrell said he had spent decades of his life turning WPP plc from a maker of wire baskets worth £1m when he bought it in 1985 to a £21bn global marketing firm.

"WPP capitalised at £1m [at its start in1985]. Today it is capitalised at £21bn. I'm not a Johnny-come-lately who picked a company up and turned it round [for a big pay day]," he said, reports The Guardian.

"If it was one five-year plan and we buggered off, fine [to criticise my pay]. Over those 31 years … I have taken a significant degree of risk. [WPP] is where my wealth is. It is long effort over a long period of time."

He added: "Everything we do gets approved by shareholders, one way or the other. In the last five years, the share price has grown from 665p to 1645p. If there is a problem, it is that the market capitalisation has grown from £8bn to £20bn.

"If there is a problem, it is that we have been successful. It's pay. I don't like the word 'pay'. It is reward for performance with risk attached."

The businessman faced a similar revolt in 2014, when 30 per cent of shareholders refused to endorse a £30m windfall that made him the best-paid executive in the FTSE 100.

This year's pay-out will be the second-largest ever given to a FTSE 100 executive, with Sorrell only out-earned by Bart Becht, who took £92m in shares and cash for helming Reckitt Benckiser in 2009.

Infographic by www.statista.com for TheWeek.co.uk.