DIARY: Rudd and Younger get onto high earners list but Bell misses the cut

'You can be rich by accident, but can only be well paid by design. Income is earned,' said The Sunday Times' Bryan Appleyard in an article to go with its annual list of Britain's Top 500 earners.

Yet the PR industry representation in the list was as notable for its absentees as for those who made the cut.

While Roland Rudd (£10m, number 48) and Rupert Younger (£3m, number 227) rank alongside a wealth of overpaid sportsmen for their exploits with Finsbury, the likes of Alan Parker and Lord Bell fail to get a mention.

WPP boss Sir Martin Sorrell creeps into the top 250 at 249 with earnings of £2.678m.

Just making the list, United Business Media chief (and thus owner of PR Newswire) Lord Hollick ranks at 428, while Charles Good took home just over £1.8m to chart at 418, buoyed by the sale of Incepta shares.

Meanwhile Lord Bell was estimated to earn a paltry £793,000 by a Marketing Services Financial Intelligence survey four months ago, just half the amount needed to enter The Sunday Times survey.