Bet365 Group awarded director Denise Coates a whopping £469 million salary in the last financial year, making it the biggest pay packet in UK corporate history.

Her £421m salary was compounded by a £45m dividend pay out thanks to her more than 50% ownership of the of the empire she built out of her father Peter’s Stoke-on-Trentbookmaking business.

Funnily enough Ms Coates was already Britain’s highest-paid boss, a title she has held for just over half a d Wade this years package an increase from the £277m the year before.

Bet365’s annual report which was delayed this year said: “The group ensures that remuneration for all employees is appropriate and fair, and is reflective of the individual’s input and contribution to the business as well as the overall performance of the group.”

Ms Coates said in the report: “I am delighted with how the group responded and adapted to these challenging circumstances.

“We continued to operate the business successfully throughout the lockdowns with business continuity plans enacted resulting in staff being able to work from home whilst significant investment was also made to ensure the office environments were COVID secure.”

However the news has received its fair share of criticism. Take Luke Hildyard, director of the High Pay Centre who said it was hard to justify the scale of her and Coates wealth.

“Of course rich people pay more tax, they have grossly disproportionate incomes. What’s relevant is how much money they have after tax and in her case it’s more than anyone can spend in multiple lifetimes,” he said.

“It’s appallingly inefficient for single individuals to hoard wealth in this way when more progressive policies on taxation, intellectual property ownership or profit sharing could re-direct it towards better public services or raising living standards for low and middle income earners.”