Monday 20 June 2022 10:46 PM Public sector workers are told not to expect pay to keep up with inflation trends now
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Public sector workers should brace themselves for a real-terms pay cut to help curb inflation, the Prime Minister said last night.
Pay awards would have to be 'proportionate and balanced', he added as the Treasury warned against 'a return to the 1970s'.
A Government source said ministers were determined to ensure that pay awards do not 'scramble to match inflation'.
Ahead of a Cabinet discussion on pay and strikes this morning, Boris Johnson said: 'It is right that we reward our hard-working public sector workers with a pay rise, but this needs to be proportionate and balanced.
'Sustained higher levels of inflation would have a far bigger impact on people's pay packets in the long run, destroying savings and extending the difficulties we're facing for longer.'
Treasury chief secretary Simon Clarke yesterday urged the private sector to demonstrate pay restraint as well to curb the 'evils of inflation'.
With the Bank of England forecasting that inflation will hit 11 per cent this year, he said it was 'not a sustainable expectation that inflation can be matched in pay offers'.
British Chief Secretary to the Treasury Simon Clarke arrives for a Cabinet meeting at 10 Downing Street in London, Britain, 14 June 2022
TUC general secretary Frances O'Grady warned that strikes will spread across the country unless workers get 'pay justice
Mr Clarke added: 'That is not something that is going to be seen across the private sector, frankly, as well as the public sector.
'We cannot get into a world where we are chasing expectations in that
