Fat cat Nigel Savage at the CoL

The figures are revealed in the most recent accounts published by the CoL which also showed Savage’s deputy earned £410,000.

The CoL, a charity set up to provide legal education, is under fire for the huge salary increases.  But David Yates, chair of the CoL’s governors who decide management remuneration, has justified the payments: “The rise in remuneration for the Chief Executive and Deputy Chief Executive last year was due, not to an increase in basic salary which stayed the same as the previous year, but instead to the award of bonuses linked to the achievement of both annual and long-term performance targets. Their contribution to the College’s success in managing our resources has allowed us to expand our operations, protecting existing jobs and creating new ones, and to deliver greater surpluses to fund our charitable activities.”

He said the salaries were set after taking professional advice on remuneration and benchmarking its salaries against both comparable organisations and private sector competitors.”

A spokesman for the union Unite, says: “Quite what students, most of whom pay over £9,000 for their courses, make of this, heaven only knows.”