The FDA has urged the new team of ministers at the Cabinet Office to reform civil service pay and training, as the union called for a "new deal" for officials.
Ahead of its annual conference today, the FDA's general secretary Dave Penman claimed that civil servants had been left "undervalued, exhausted and unclear about the future of the services they deliver" after five years of budget restraint and Whitehall reform.
“If the civil service is being tasked with delivering 21st century public services with pre-war resources, then the government needs to demonstrate that valuing civil servants, ensuring that they have the right skills, paying them fairly, matching commitments to resources and genuinely engaging with them are the critical elements of the new deal that needs to be struck with civil servants," Penman said.
Calling for a "different relationship" with civil servants, Penman – whose union represents more than 18,000 senior officials across government – said the civil service pay system was still failing to reward talented officials and attract people with the right skills into the public sector.
Civil service pay was frozen for the two years after 2010, with subsequent pay rises capped at 1%. At the latest Budget, chancellor George Osborne confirmed that all departments had now agreed to end time-served "progression" pay rises across the civil service.
CSW will be reporting on today's FDA conference, which includes a keynote speech from civil service chief executive John Manzoni