What was Peter Murrell salary? Seniority, region and UK take-home pay

What was Peter Murrell salary? The honest starting point

Anyone asking what was Peter Murrell salary is looking for one verified number. That number is not available in the official pay statistics used across this site. Peter Murrell was chief executive of the Scottish National Party, and that single post does not sit inside any published pay category. The ONS Annual Survey of Hours and Earnings reports median and percentile pay by occupation, region and sector rather than naming individuals. HMRC publishes taxpayer totals and percentile ranges. GOV.UK sets the National Living Wage and National Minimum Wage and the rules for Income Tax and National Insurance. None of these sources confirms a salary for that specific role.

So this article does not repeat an unverified figure. Instead it explains how a senior post of that kind is normally judged, and what a comparable gross salary actually leaves after Income Tax, employee National Insurance, pension and student loan deductions. If you want to test a figure for yourself, the take-home calculator will do the arithmetic from the published 2026/27 rates.

Why official statistics rarely answer individual pay questions

The ONS ASHE is a survey of employee jobs, not a register of named salaries. It reports medians and percentiles, which is precisely why it is useful for judging a role rather than a person. A party chief executive is a one-off position, so there is no sample of equivalent jobs to average. HMRC's income statistics work at the level of whole taxpayer populations, and GOV.UK's wage legislation sets legal minimums rather than salaries for particular posts. Where a precise figure is missing, the honest answer is to say so and use comparators.

How senior is a chief executive post?

ONS ASHE shows median full-time gross annual pay of £39,039 for employees who had been in the same job for at least a year, based on April 2025 provisional figures. That is up 4.3 per cent from £37,439 a year earlier. The same release gives median gross weekly pay of £766.60 for full-time employees, £280.00 for part-time employees and median hourly pay of £19.67 excluding overtime. Public sector full-time weekly pay was £807.67 against £752.28 in the private sector.

Percentiles set the seniority ladder more usefully than the median. For full-time jobs, ASHE shows the 10th percentile at £23,990, the 25th at £29,262, the median at £39,039, the 75th at £54,009 and the 90th at £76,903. A chief executive of a national organisation would normally sit at or above the upper end of that spread. That is a reasonable inference about seniority; it is not a salary figure, and no precise number should be attached to it without an official source.

Regional differences matter more than most people expect

ONS ASHE, April 2025 provisional, gives median gross weekly pay for all employee jobs by where employees live: London 767.40, South East 678.00, East of England 670.80, Scotland 642.90, West Midlands 619.70, North West 615.90, South West 613.60, East Midlands 605.90, Wales 601.80, Yorkshire and the Humber 600.00, Northern Ireland 594.10 and the North East 577.90, against a UK figure of 642.50. These are survey estimates, so small gaps between regions may not be statistically significant.

HMRC's taxpayer figures show the same shape: in 2023-24 London had the highest regional median total income at £35,700 and the highest mean at £61,200, while the North East had the lowest, at £27,500 and £34,100. Because the role in question was Scotland-based, Scotland's median and Scotland's tax bands matter more here than London's.

Scotland uses different Income Tax bands

Scotland has six Income Tax bands, from 19 per cent to 48 per cent, set by the Scottish Parliament. National Insurance is the same across the UK. For 2026/27 the Scottish bands run: starter rate 19 per cent on £12,571 to £15,397; basic rate 20 per cent on £15,398 to £27,491; intermediate rate 21 per cent on £27,492 to £43,662; higher rate 42 per cent on £43,663 to £75,000; advanced rate 45 per cent on £75,001 to £125,140; top rate 48 per cent above £125,140. Elsewhere in the UK the basic rate is 20 per cent up to £50,270, the higher rate is 40 per cent up to £125,140 and the additional rate is 45 per cent above that. A senior salary between roughly £43,700 and £75,000 therefore carries more Income Tax in Scotland than the same salary in England, Wales or Northern Ireland.

What a senior salary actually leaves in your hand

Two reference points from the published tables. On £35,000 gross, England, Wales or Northern Ireland, standard tax code 1257L, no pension and no student loan, take-home pay is about £28,720 a year, or £2,393 a month. On the ONS median of £39,039, it is about £31,628 a year, or £2,636 a month.

The shape changes at £50,270. Income Tax moves from the basic rate of 20 per cent to the higher rate of 40 per cent, and employee National Insurance falls from 8 per cent to 2 per cent on earnings above the upper earnings limit. Above £125,140 the additional rate of 45 per cent applies. Higher salaries therefore lose a bigger share of each extra pound, and pension contributions or student loan repayments reduce take-home further because they are deducted before the money reaches your account.

Everyone has a Personal Allowance of £12,570, so that slice is free of Income Tax, though National Insurance still applies on earnings above it. The standard code is 1257L, and millions of people are on the wrong code, so it is worth checking your payslip. Our salary data pages set out more reference points across the pay range.

Age and career stage

ONS ASHE also splits full-time median pay by age. April 2025 figures show £23,596 for ages 18 to 21, £32,347 for 22 to 29, £40,668 for 30 to 39, £44,244 for 40 to 49, £41,866 for 50 to 59 and £36,467 for 60 and over. After 2026/27 Income Tax and National Insurance, those translate to roughly £1,709, £2,234, £2,733, £2,948, £2,805 and £2,481 a month. Median pay peaks in the 40s, which is also when chief executive and equivalent posts are typically held, but this describes the workforce as a whole, not an individual.

Which average should you compare against?

There are two headline medians and they measure different things. The ONS figure of £39,039 is the median gross pay of full-time employees who have been in the same job for at least a year. HMRC's figure of £29,700 is the median total income of everyone who paid Income Tax, including part-time workers, the self-employed and pensioners. Use the ONS figure to compare a full-time salary and the HMRC figure to see where a total income ranks. Our salary articles explain the distinction in more detail, and topics collects related guides.

The practical answer

On what was Peter Murrell salary, the honest position is that no verified figure appears in the official sources this site relies on, and any precise number should be treated with caution unless it comes from an official statement or filed accounts. What can be said confidently is that the post was a senior one, that senior pay sits towards the top of the ONS distribution, that Scotland-based pay is shaped by Scottish Income Tax bands as well as by the region's median, and that take-home pay is always lower than gross once Income Tax, National Insurance, pension and student loan deductions are applied. Use published comparators and a calculator, and check your own payslip rather than relying on a figure attributed to someone else.