Four in five senior civil servants think the SCS pay system is unfair, according to a survey by unions in which officials described pay progression as “a joke” and noted pay discrepancies as high as £30,000.
Some 86% of respondents to the FDA and Prospect survey – submitted as part of the unions’ annual evidence to the Senior Salaries Review Body – said they were 'dissatisfied or very dissatisfied' with pay progression while more than a quarter said a cap on promotion pay had put them off applying for SCS jobs.
The unions called on the government to “urgently implement capability-based pay to resolve some of the long standing and chronic issues with the pay structure”.
They also called for a service-wide approach to recording and compensating senior civil servants for overtime.
In the evidence for 2023-24, submitted to the SSRB in January, the unions also demanded there be no repeat of last year’s pay award, when the government watered down the body’s recommendations, applying 3% average pay increase rather than 3.5%.
The government must commit to implement all recommendations made by the independent SSRB in full this time around, the unions said.
The evidence said all members of the SCS should receive a fair and reasonable consolidated pay award in 2023/24 that adequately addresses the rise in cost of living – a request which has been, at least partially, met by the Cabinet Office’s recommendation that senior officials receive a similar increase to rank-and-file civil servants.
The unions' evidence also includes economic analysis suggesting the median SCS salary has dropped 22% against RPI since 2010. But the wide-ranging concerns expressed in the annual survey, undertaken from December 2022-January 2023, shows that pay anger in the SCS goes far beyond this drop in spending power.
Senior civil servants told the survey their pay is decreasing in value while their responsibilities increase; they see no link between pay and performance; and described how colleagues at the same or a lower level are earning much higher salaries. This has hit morale and led to more senior officials wanting out, according to the survey.
'Scandalous' pay discrepancy amid stalling reform
Senior civil servants told the survey how a lack of pay progression in the SCS along with the 10% cap on pay rises through promotion, had led to a significant drop in real-terms pay and stark pay disparities.
“Pay progression is so poor it is a joke, and my pay has been reducing in real terms every year since I was promoted to SCS2,” said respondent. "Frankly people I know, even elsewhere in the public sector, laugh when I tell them what I earn."
“I have colleagues doing the same job for the same period on £30k more – it is scandalous,” said another.
Others told the unions they had been informally advised to leave the civil service and rejoin to achieve equal pay.
Plans to address pay progression issues have been in the works since 2018, but the Cabinet Office’s evidence to the SSRB, published last week, revealed there had been little progress on its scheme to tackle the problem: capability-based pay.
Senior officials said the current system leaves them feeling “utterly demotivated”, with promotion their only route to a pay rise.
But they also described how the the 10% cap on pay rises through promotion means even those who do get a promotion-based pay boost are often much worse off than colleagues at the same level and even junior colleagues, as new entrants into the civil service can negotiate significantly higher pay.
A quarter of respondents to the survey said they manage someone on higher pay than them, with many officials stating they recently joined the SCS and now regret it.
“I earned more with paid overtime and less responsibility than I earn as a member of SCS with more responsibility, longer hours and managing staff receiving more than I earn,” said one official.
Another new senior official said staying below the SCS would have left them on “pretty much the same pay and half the stress”.
Some comments from senior civil servants also highlighted how the broken system perpetuates gender and age-based discrepancies.
One female civil servant said she manages three men, who – like her – are all deputy directors but all earn more than her “because they were externally recruited and so could negotiate a higher salary”.
Another said they have been rotated to a role where their – much older – predecessor earned £20,000 more than them, which they said was partly due to their age and partly because they were able to keep their salary from their previous non-civil service job.
Senior officials also raised concern about the lack of link between pay and performance, saying “lacklustre performance gets the same pay as very good”, making them feel their hard work is “thankless”. In this area the Cabinet Office has made some progress since the survey was carried out, fully implementing a performance framework in April.
In light of these widespread and wide-ranging concerns, just 3% of senior officials said they believe the government has an effective strategy for the SCS.
They said the government is too focused on “short-term fads”, such as Dominic Cummings’ “weirdos and disruptors” drive or the push to recruit more officials from the private sector, and not enough on its own workforce.
Officials also criticised departments “wildly” and “often fruitlessly” spending on expensive consultants and contractors while neglecting to invest in their own workforce.
Morale dips and officials want out as long hours revealed
The survey also found extensive levels of working overtime, with the unions demanding a service-wide approach to recording and compensating SCS for additional hours worked, either through time off in lieu or additional payments.
Close to half of respondents to the SCS survey (48%) said they regularly work eleven hours or more over their contracted hours every week to get their work done.
The unions’ survey also revealed a drop in morale, with three-quarters of respondents saying their morale had decreased in the last year, and an increasing desire to leave the civil service: three-quarters said they are more inclined to look for a job outside the civil service than they were a year ago; four in ten said they were actively looking fora job outside the civil service; and a quarter said they want to leave as soon as possible.
Senior officials ranked pay, resourcing and workload as the key reasons for wanting to leave.
A Cabinet Office spokesperson said: "The introduction of a mechanism for capability-based pay for the SCS is included within the Declaration on Government Reform and ministers are focused on creating a model that rewards productivity and drives retention of the best talent."
"We have submitted evidence to the independent Senior Salaries Review Body, setting out further detail on our proposed vision for the Senior Civil Servant pay framework," they added.
“It’s important that pay awards help us attract, retain and develop the very best senior talent for government, while remaining affordable."