CIVIL servants will be balloted for strike action after their union PCS confirmed yesterday that ministers are using the spending review from 2015 to budget for a 1 per cent pay rise.

PCS said that the government has gone back on its promise to end low pay in its own departments.

Ministers have told union negotiators that any pay rises would have to come from individual departmental savings and cuts.

The government has also said that the consultation process with PCS was ending even though Monday night was the first time the union had had sight of government plans for pay. 

Up to 150,000 PCS members working in passport and tax offices, prisons, border control, job centres, and law courts will be balloted on June 18 and could walk out after the ballot closes on July 23.

PCS general secretary Mark Serwotka, who spent yesterday in talks with Cabinet Office officials, said:  “We have always been in favour of a negotiated settlement but it is now clear that ministers are not interested.”