Senior Salaries Review Body

1 March 2007

The Prime Minister announced today the publication of the twenty-ninth report of the Review Body on Senior Salaries. The report makes recommendations about the pay of the senior civil service, senior military personnel and the judiciary from 1st April 2007.

• Press notice jargon buster

The Review Body's main recommendations for senior civil servants' pay are:

i) changes to senior civil service pay ranges as follows:

Pay Band

1. 1
2. 1A
3. 2
4. 3

Minimum

1. 56,100
2. 65,280
3. 81,600
4. 99,960

Recruitment & Performance Ceiling

1. 116,000
2. 127,000
3. 160,000
4. 205,000

ii) the bonus pot for the SCS to be increased by 1.1 percentage points to 7.6 per cent of the paybill and for the minimum bonus to remain at £3,000; and

iii) the Permanent Secretaries new range to be £139,740 to £273,250.

The Review Body broadly endorses the Government's strategy for senior reward but places a slightly greater emphasis on bonus awards rather than base pay awards, with a recommendation of a headline award of 1.4%.

The Review Body's main recommendation for the senior military is:

• an increase 2% in the incremental pay scales for senior military officers.

The Review Body's main recommendation for the judiciary is

• an increase averaging 2.4% for judicial salaries

The Government is accepting the recommendations for all three groups. The recommendation for the senior military and for base pay for the SCS will be accepted in full. The recommendation for the SCS bonus pot is also being accepted, but payment will be delayed until 1 November 2007. The recommended headline award for the judiciary of 2.4% will be staged to 1.5%. All office holders will receive 1.5% with effect from 1 April 2007, and the balance of the recommended amount will be paid with effect from 1 November 2007. This is to ensure affordability within existing spending limits and consistency with continuing control of public finances.

The Government's proposed recommendations on SCS Pay have the implication that Ministers' and MPs' pay, which is linked to the average increase in the midpoint of SCS pay, will increase by 0.66%. In line with the approach taken across all PRB groups the Government has decided to accept this, as it is in line with what was proposed in the evidence. The SSRB are also currently conducting a triennial review of MPs' and Ministers' pay which is due to report in summer 2007.

The Government remains committed to the independent Pay Review Body process. It does not take decisions to stage recommendations lightly.

Copies of the Review Body on Senior Salaries' report are available in the vote office, the Library of the House, and will be available from the Office of Manpower Economics' website www.ome.uk.com/ tomorrow.