Compensation Costs Skyrocket at Tony Blair’s Africa Charity

A charity established by the former British Prime Minister Tony Blair to alleviate poverty and improve national governance in Africa paid its employees nearly $2.5-million last year, a more than six-fold increase in staff costs from 2009, The Telegraph reports.

The Tony Blair Africa Governance Initiative employed nearly 30 permanent and temporary workers as well as contractors in 2010 after paying compensation of about $383,000 to five staff members the previous year, according to the U.K. daily. The charity’s income increased from about $2-million to $5-million.

A spokesman for the organization said that given its work, “the majority of our costs will be on salaries and the accommodation, transport and security costs associated with having people living in some of the world’s most fragile states.”

He said the charity’s trustees compare its wages with comparable groups and “are satisfied that [they] are reasonable for the sector.”