Pay frozen if GPG loses money - Gibbs

Nobody gets a pay rise or bonus at Guinness Peat Group while the investment company is losing money, says director Tony Gibbs.

NZX-listed GPG recorded Gibbs' total salary payments as £686,272 ($1,450,299) in 2009 up from £619,073 ($1,308,215) the previous year.

But Gibbs said his salary in the two years was the exactly the same when converted to New Zealand dollars, allowing for exchange rates.

"There has been no bonuses paid, no salary increase and no executive options given out when we moved into loss," Gibbs said.

GPG's loss for the year ending December 31 was £36 million - down from £50 million the previous year.

"Our bonus scheme ... it's worked on profit and you have to make a 12.5 per cent return on profit before anybody, anywhere gets anything so the shareholders get paid first," he said.

"We've had losses in various jurisdictions and we've accounted for them as one would under IFRS [New Zealand International Financial Reporting Standards] and hopefully this'll be the last of them."

Gibbs was the best-paid executive in 2007 in the Herald's annual pay survey with a total package of $6.9 million, but in 2008 that dropped to $2.8 million. His total remuneration package last year was £1.2 million.

Foreign exchange fluctuations was one reason chairman Sir Ron Brierley offered for GPG's worse than expected result for the year ending December.