TUI boss Peter Long’s salary of £13.3 million made him the fourth highest paid chief executive amongst FTSE 100 firms last year.
His pay packet is one of several called into question by the High Pay Centre think tank, which found that top bosses earned an average of £4.964 million last year compared with £4.129 million in 2010.
Deborah Hargreaves said: "Pay packages of this size go far beyond what is sensible or necessary to reward and inspire top executives.
"It’s more likely that corporate governance structures in the UK are riddled with glaring weaknesses and conflicts of interest.
"The coalition Government introduced some welcome reforms in 2013 that have at least enabled us to get a better understanding of the executive pay racket.
"However it’s clear that these reforms didn’t do nearly enough to start building a pay culture where everybody is rewarded fairly and proportionally for the work that they do."
The High Pay Centre said new laws forcing UK-listed companies to publish the pay of their top executives had had almost no effect in curbing what it described as ‘excessive’ salaries.
