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Pay freeze for senior civil servants

11 March 2010

Is it really as tough as it sounds?

The Government has announced:

This morning (Wednesday 10 March), the Government formally responded to the Senior Salaries Review Body’s (SSRB) annual report with a written ministerial statement that was laid in Parliament at 9.30am. In the statement, the Government explained that it has accepted the following recommendations:

no general increase in base pay for the Senior Civil Service in 2010-11

the budget for non-consolidated performance-related payments should remain at 8.6 per cent of the Senior Civil Service pay bill

there should be no increase in base pay for Permanent Secretaries.

Reading this through we can see a number of “get out” phrases that could mean a thaw in the freeze.

The phrase “no general increase in base pay” does not preclude individuals getting an increase in their base pay; it just precludes all senior civil servants getting the same increase.

DfT has announced that it is reducing the number of senior managers in the department. If the budget for non-consolidated performance-related payments is fixed at 8.6 per cent of the Senior Civil Service pay bill as it was (i.e. before the reductions in senior management are made) then that budget will be shared out among less senior managers and hence individuals can get bigger bonuses.

Even if “base pay” is really frozen that doesn’t stop other non “base pay” elements being increased.

Over the next few weeks we will seek further information from DfT as to how solid is the freeze.
 

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