Civil service pay is “broken” with staff morale plummeting, a leading trade union has warned.
Prospect, which represents 34,000 of the government’s most qualified staff, has called on the Treasury and government departments to honour the due dates for pay settlements or compensate staff for the loss.
A key settlement date for many Whitehall pay agreements -1 August – has passed, but virtually no offers have been tabled for 2008 and several are still outstanding from last year.
Dai Hudd, deputy general secretary, said: “More than 90% of Prospect members should have had a pay settlement for this year by now, but we are still waiting for Treasury clearance of dozens of pay remits across the Civil Service. Our members are reaching breaking point – Civil Service pay is broken but must be fixed.”
A union survey of attitudes to pay, skills and working conditions completed by more than 5,000 members found that lack of pay progression was the single biggest cause of dissatisfaction.
This has been compounded by sub-inflation pay rises – last year more than a third of Prospect’s Civil Service members received an increase of less than 2% – the government’s own target for public sector pay.
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“This adds insult to injury and means that civil servants fare even worse than counterparts in other parts of the public sector, where progression costs are separated from the basic pay award,” said Hudd.
In May government departments were warned to brace themselves for a new wave of strikes. The PCS union revealed plans to cause “severe disruption” across the UK over the next few months.
