Natural England workers strike over pay and conditions
Natural England civil servants' strike © Prospect Members of Prospect union working in the Civil Service, including for Natural England and the Animal and Plant Health Agency (Apha), have staged a second day of strike action over pay, job losses and redundancy terms.
This follows a previous strike on 15 March.
In addition to the strike action, workers have been taking measures short of a strike continuously since 16 March, including working to rule and an overtime ban.
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Prospect says this is the largest industrial action it has taken in more than a decade.
It said the second day of strike action on 10 May follows the refusal of the government to enter negotiations to resolve the current pay and conditions dispute.
The government has imposed a pay control of 4.5%, which Prospect says “will further erode living standards, with inflation running at 10.1%.
This leaves civil servants with some of the worst pay settlements in the public sector this year”.
Members’ pay has declined by up to 26% since 2010 in real terms.
Mike Clancy, general secretary of Prospect, said: “For months, we have been pressing ministers to put forward a serious offer that recognises the cost-of-living crisis facing our members.
“But instead of coming to the negotiating table, the government has published a pay control of 4.5% for 2023-24 – with nothing on the table for last year.
“This industrial action was entirely avoidable, but the failure by government to make a comparable offer to elsewhere in the public sector has made it inevitable.”
MPs have raised concerns over whether Natural England and Apha are properly resourced to cope with the challenges of implementing the farming transition.
A Natural England spokesperson said: “We have plans in place to minimise any disruption to our critical activities and reduce impacts on our customers and colleagues.
“Natural England is constrained by the public sector pay rules and can only make pay awards within the limits set by the Treasury.”