The Public and Commercial Services trade union has called for a 5% pay increase for civil servants as it plans a day of protest across the country to call on the government to end the current 1% cap.
The union has written to Cabinet Office minister David Lidington, who has responsibility for civil service pay, to highlight the union’s estimate that the average civil servant has lost £4,400 due to inflation since the two-year pay freeze began in 2010, with a subsequent 1% limit on increases.
Multiplied by the total number of full-time equivalent civil service staff, currently 381,150, this means that civil servants as a whole have lost £1.7bn, PCS general secretary Mark Serwotka said. Similar studies by the Prospect trade union have also found that its members working in the civil service and wider public sector have seen a drop in their living standards of 15%.
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“Civil servants have suffered years of pay freezes and caps. The figures show the true cost of austerity. This is money that should have been in member’s purses and wallets. It would have helped the local and national economy as members would have spent this on goods and services.
“It’s time the chancellor got a grip on this situation. Our members can’t afford another year of this.”
The submission has been sent to the Cabinet Office, although there is no collective bargaining for civil servants below the Senior Civil Service, where the Senior Salaries Review Body consults and then advises ministers on pay.
As well as the call for a 5% pay increase, or £1,200 if this is greater, the PCS has also called for a return to national pay bargaining to replace the current and costly system of over 200 pay bargaining units across government.
Protests will take place tomorrow at major civil service workplaces. A PCS ballot late last year found 80% of members were willing to take industrial action if the government did not take steps to end the pay cap. The union has since said it is preparing for a statutory strike ballot.