Patrick Carlyon: These are workers who truly deserve a pay rise

With Melbourne City council CEO scoring a pay rise of up to $20k, it begs the question; what rises might others — who have shone in adversity – merit?

The chief executive of the City of Melbourne has just scored a pay rise of up to $20,000.

Justin Hanney, who is just one chief executive of 79 Victorian local councils, earns more than the Premier or the federal opposition leader.

He now receives more than $500,000 a year to sit in a pay bracket alongside the Prime Minister, who must pretend to be friends with China, manage the upcoming economic Armageddon, pretend to like sports he does not like, and remember the price of petrol per litre (tip: about the same as cheap wine).

Hanney’s pay rise comes in the aftermath of lockdown, when many council services shut down and events got cancelled. He administers a space where, even months later, you can still at times swing a cat in Bourke St, a tiger in Flinders St and a lion in Federation Square without anyone noticing.

Melbourne City council CEO Justin Hanney now earns over $500k.

Assuming Hanney’s pay rise is warranted, does it set a bar for income boosts for other professions?

If he is worth a 4 per cent pay rise, what rises might others — who have shone in adversity – merit?

North Melbourne captain and/or coach: For striving to offer hope where there is little – 5 per cent pay rise.

Queen Elizabeth: For long service, and for always declining to call out her more idiotic relatives of both blood and marriage even when the temptation must be overwhelming – 6 per cent.

Police Association secretary Wayne Gatt: For repeatedly calling out Covid measures that police officers neither needed to nor wanted to enforce, such as patrolling playgrounds and asking old ladies why they were sitting on public benches – 8 per cent.

Store owners who asked for proof of vaccination certificates, even when almost everyone was vaccinated, knowing that many customers would resist their hapless obligation to follow state-imposed rules – 9 per cent.

Workers had to ask countless customer about their vaccination status. Picture: David Geraghty

Celebrants who made the best of wedding and funeral services when most of the “guests” were somewhere else – 10 per cent.

Public figures who candidly admit “I was wrong”. Or “I don’t know”. Such people restore the loss of faith in politicians. Imagine if Premier Dan Andrews apologised for the hotel quarantine scandal, then marked the tragedy of 800-odd needless deaths by adding: “And I resign” – 11 per cent.

Epidemiologists: After lifetimes of going to barbecues where they had to explain what they did and how to spell it, epidemiologists bravely told us what we didn’t often want to hear. The better ones queried the misplaced, politically expedient and draconian measures of tin-pot leaders who fixated on petty rules rather than the dreadful effects of those same rules – 13 per cent.

Teachers: For the online education of students who instead played Roblox with their mates – 14 per cent.

Principals: For putting up with the parents of the kids who played Roblox, supervised unnecessary classroom and playground Covid rules, then tolerated the unashamed hoarding of RAT tests by parents who didn’t want to pay for them – 16 per cent.

Nurses (1): For promising that Covid jabs would not hurt and therefore calming neurotic middle-aged men and others who had secretly nursed a lifelong fear of anything sharp being shoved in their arms – 14 per cent.

Nurses (2): For enduring a hotbox of PPE clothing, critically unwell patients, their understandably angry relatives who didn’t like that there could be no goodbye, as well as the exhausting hours and slim prospects that the day-to-day onslaught would ease – 22 per cent.

Socceroo Andrew Redmayne: For bestowing upon us many more hours of World Cup pleasure (and pain) – 32 per cent.

Ambos because they perform heroics on a daily basis – 39 per cent.

Any analyst who can navigate the dizzying array of possibilities for the upcoming state election and alight on outcomes which magically turn out to be somewhat accurate – 42 per cent.

Anyone who fixes the triple-0 debacle; or the ambulance ramping crisis; or the Monash Freeway traffic; or reduces the extortionate parking fees at Melbourne airport; or can find a helpline phone number for Centrelink or Telstra; or can explain why the electricity might go off tonight; or can decipher how childcare subsidies work; or can successfully argue why the presence of roadworks around every single street corner need not be a cornerstone of Melbourne’s economic recovery – 44 per cent.