Teacher, train driver, lecturer, civil servant — to which one would you award a pay rise? When these professions join a “national day of action” on February 1, they will present a united front.
In reality, they will probably be competing for the spoils. The cost to a cash-strapped government of raising public sector pay with inflation — let alone making up years of stagnant wages — is estimated to be £18 billion.
For more than a year, each union has been using data to present a compelling argument for their members to get a pay rise. Mick Whelan, general secretary of Aslef, the train drivers’ union, said the government’s latest pay offer — flatly rejected two weeks ago — represented “a 20 per cent
