It’s a tough job - does anybody want it?

In the same week that chancellor George Osborne heralded a new era of austerity in the public sector, Network Rail was announcing £2.4m of bonuses to senior management. It was a move that might have been designed to trigger a wave of protests, and it did.

The biggest offender was the outgoing chief executive Iain Coucher, whose £641,000 bonus bumped his total earnings to £1.45m, a 53% increase on last year.

Coucher must have seen the trouble coming as just 10 days earlier he...