The merger of Breast Cancer Campaign and Breakthrough Breast Cancer to form a new charity, Breast Cancer Now, cost £3m, according to the new charity's recently published accounts.

The accounts for the year ending 31 July 2015 also show that Breast Cancer Now reduced by nine the number of senior staff with salaries of more than £60,000, since merging from two separate charities just over a year ago.

One of those took home a pay packet of between £150,000 and £160,000 including termination payments.

Four of those terminated staff earned between £80,000 and £90,000 including redundancy payments, according to the charity’s first set of annual accounts.

The charity said earlier this year it had cut its total number of posts by a quarter following the merger, but the accounts reveal that the total cost of wages and salaries rose by £798,000 over the year, and show little change in average staff numbers over the year - down from 208 to 207.

A spokesman for Breast Cancer Now confirmed the increase in salary expediture came as a result of fees arrising from the merger such as redundancy payments. Since the annual report was compiled last July, the charity currently has 159 staff on its payroll, the spokesman said.

The charity’s total income dropped over the year – from a combined £28.5m for the year ending 31 July 2014, to £26,997 last year. Charitable expenditure also dropped from £20.7m to £16.1m over the year.

The charity’s chair Lynne Berry OBE said it was an “extraordinary year” for the charity.

“Now the UK’s largest breast cancer charity… we merged at a pace and launched Breast Cancer Now at a hugely challenging time for charities,” she said in the report’s introduction.

“Operating as a new charity, we’re confident that more women will benefit from our research, faster. The environment we’re creating is more collaborative – and more innovative.”