Nine full-time-equivalent posts added since Theresa May and three advisers paid more than £140,000

This article is more than 9 months old

This article is more than 9 months old

Boris Johnson has expanded the government’s team of taxpayer-funded special advisers compared with Theresa May’s time in office, with three identified as being paid more than £140,000 a year.

Lee Cain, the director of communications, Sir Eddie Lister, the chief strategic adviser, and Munira Mirza, the director of the No 10 policy unit and co-author of the Tories’ 2019 election manifesto, are listed as the top earners, with a further four earning between £120,000 and £129,999.

Dominic Cummings, the chief special adviser to the prime minister, is paid between £95,000 and £99,999, according to details published in the government’s annual report on special advisers.

Lister worked with Johnson when the latter was London mayor, and Mirza was Johnson’s deputy mayor for education and culture.

Special advisers, known as Spads, are temporary civil servants. The list shows staffing has increased from 99 full-time-equivalent employees under May to 108 under Johnson.

The prime minister’s personal advisory team has also expanded, with 44 members of staff now in place compared with May’s 37.

Prominent members of Johnson’s election media team included his press secretary, Robert Oxley, who is paid between £85,000 and £89,999. The former Vote Leave staffer was caught saying “for fuck’s sake” towards a journalist live on TV during the campaign, shortly before Johnson was filmed walking into an industrial fridge as the reporter sought to interview him.

The deputy press secretary, Lucia Hodgson, is paid between £75,000 and £79,999. Nikki Da Costa, a legal adviser who worked with Johnson on the prorogation of parliament in September and early October, is paid between £125,000 and £129,000.

The total cost for Spad staffing was £9.6m in the period from 1 April 2018 and 31 March this year, compared with £8.9m in the previous 12 months. Johnson took over as prime minister in July this year.

The home secretary Priti Patel’s top adviser, James Starkie, another former Vote Leave staff member, is paid between £80,000 and £85,000. He was asked to leave Stranger’s Bar in the Houses of Parliament in the autumn after the police were called over him allegedly using abusive language.

Richard Holden, who was an adviser to the education secretary, Gavin Williamson, was paid between £57,000 and £78,000 and won himself a pay rise when he was elected as the MP for North West Durham. An MP’s starting salary is £79,468.