BRITAIN’S fat cats scrambled to distance themselves from their club’s newest applicant yesterday, slamming the “inflammatory” £25 million pay packet offered to the would-be chief executive of BG Group.

Outraged gas workers demanded an 85 per cent tax “deterrent” on millionaire wages after Helge Lund was offered pay worth that of 2,113 minimum-wage workers to run the privatised firm.

The Institute of Directors (IoD) said it feared that the cash-and-shares package would be “a red rag to the enemies of the free market” and urged shareholders to reject it at a December 15 extraordinary general meeting.