Question to the Cabinet Office:

To ask the Minister for the Cabinet Office, whether he has made a recent assessment of the potential merits of increasing the pay of civil servants.

Pay for grades below the Senior Civil Service is delegated to departments. Pay awards are made by individual departments, in consideration of their own priorities and affordability, and discussed with their trade unions.

The pay remit guidance is a cost control document and allows departments to seek further flexibility for a pay award above the headline range for pay awards, as demonstrated by pay deals in Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs and the Ministry of Justice in previous years.

It is important that pay awards for civil servants are affordable, as well as fair to both staff and the taxpayer. The pay remit guidance considers economic conditions while balancing the need for sustainable public finances. The 2023/24 guidance will be published this year.