It looks like the UK Daily Mail has done some digging and noticed the same thing I did—that the International Rescue Committee’s head honcho, former British Foreign Secretary David Miliband has almost reached the million dollar a year salary making him a member of what one British government agency called “begging bowl barons!”
Consider the fact that Miliband’s meteoric salary rise comes as the IRC is closing resettlement offices and letting staff go around the US while they whine about cuts in refugee admissions being made by the Trump Administration.
Here is the story from Sunday at the Daily Mail:
Million-dollar Miliband! Former Labour Minister’s pay soars to $911,000 at US refugee charity that takes huge sums from British taxpayer
Former Labour Foreign Secretary David Miliband is being paid almost $1 million a year to run a humanitarian charity that receives massive sums from British taxpayers.
His astonishing pay package as chief executive of International Rescue Committee has soared to $911,796 (£741,883) – almost five times the salary of the British Prime Minister – according to the US-based organisation’s latest tax return.
Mr Miliband’s income has swelled by $240,047 (£195,314) over the past two years while he has toured the world demanding more support for refugees, migrants and victims of conflict, and hobnobbing with billionaires, royals and presidents.
Other senior figures at his organisation are also creaming in the cash, with the 12 top-paid officials pocketing more than £4 million between them – a collective rise of £1.1 million in just two years.
The revelation – the latest pay scandal in the aid industry exposed by The Mail on Sunday – provoked calls last night for the charity to stop receiving British cash until it curbs the huge salaries.
The IRC has been handed £107 million over the past two years by the Department for International Development to run refugee, health and poverty-relief projects in Africa, Asia and the Middle East. [That is peanuts compared to the over $415 million the US government gave the IRC in one recent year—ed]
‘They say charity begins at home and clearly it does for the top bosses in this organisation,’ said Tory MP Nigel Evans, a member of the Commons International Development Committee.
‘This is a grotesque waste of money given by British taxpayers to help the most vulnerable families around the world. Instead, it is being funnelled to the Miliband family – and until the IRC puts their house in order we should stop funding them.’
The revelation comes amid talk that Mr Miliband might return to British politics.
Here is a frightening statistic. Everyone of you should be careful about where you are sending your hard-earned charitable dollars.
‘This salary is in the middle of the range of New York’s non-profit CEO salaries,’ it added.
I have an extensive archive on David Miliband that extends back to his earliest days in 2013 as the CEO of the International Rescue Committee (the wealthiest of the nine federal refugee contractors). Actually the wealthiest as far as we know because it is pretty difficult to determine exactly how much the US Catholic Bishops get along with their extensive network of Catholic Charities.
***For new readers these are the nine federally-funded resettlement contractors:
- Church World Service (CWS)
- Ethiopian Community Development Council (ECDC)
- Episcopal Migration Ministries (EMM)
- Hebrew Immigrant Aid Society (HIAS)
- International Rescue Committee (IRC)
- US Committee for Refugees and Immigrants (USCRI)
- Lutheran Immigration and Refugee Services (LIRS)
- United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB)
- World Relief Corporation (WR)