FDA general secretary Dave Penman has said the civil service may be "on the brink of a breakthrough" when it comes to pay reform.
Speaking at the union's annual conference on Thursday morning, Penman said the union for senior civil servants has recently been working in "true partnership" with the Cabinet Office and Senior Salaries Review Body to co-create solutions to the "decades long problems" with SCS pay – and that this should also bring rewards for civil servants at all grades.
Penman said the SSRB, under the leadership of its chair Lea Paterson, who took up the role in October 2024, has "demonstrated the value of what an independent, evidence-based review body can achieve".
"They understand the challenges every bit of the public sector faces when it comes to pay reform, but they are focussed on delivering on longer term strategy as well as addressing shorter term pressures," he said.
"The result is they are setting the agenda for pay reform across the service, not just the SCS."
Penman said the current government "has made some good decisions, ending the imbalance between the rest of the public sector and the civil service in the annual pay rounds" and honouring pay review body recommendations.
Using a football analogy, Penman expressed confidence that further positive change is on the horizon.
"Right now, with this UK government, it feels a bit like Partick Thistle in the [Scottish] Championship play off semi final," he said. "After Tuesday night’s 1-1 draw away at Dunfermline Athletic, and I’m sure I’m not alone in this room thinking about this, we could be on the brink of a breakthrough. Years of hard work, with many false dawns, but the promise of better things to come within our grasp."
Penman said he was asked by a minister a few weeks ago what the FDA's main priorities were, and he explained that pay was "the key to unlocking so many issues within the civil service, ensuring we recruit, retain, and motivate the workforce".
He said his plea to the minister was for "urgent pay reform, an end to the cycle of political interference that has blighted civil service pay for those three decades, and a strengthened, independent pay review body for the whole of the civil service".
"After nearly three decades, the current system is on life support, but we need bold ideas and bold ministers to make change happen," Penman told conference attendees.
"But like Thistle’s performance on Tuesday, dogged, relentless, and with their sleeves rolled up for the hard graft, FDA has been driving the agenda in departments, nations and with the Cabinet Office."
Later on in the day, in a speech at the same conference, Darren Jones, the chief secretary to the prime minister, confirmed that the government will be publishing its response to the SSRB's recommendations on pay and progression for 2026-27 this month. And he said the response will include changes to SCS bonuses.
"We will be awarding higher, but fewer, bonuses to those exceptional civil servants who do delivery, innovation and go above and beyond for the public, and I'm determined that we give civil servants what they need to make that mark," Jones said.
This follows a promise in January from Jones to change the bonus system for senior leaders in the civil service to ”reward the doers”.
Jones said at the time that 55% of senior civil servants were receiving some form of a bonus, which meant bonuses were spread too thinly among officials ”for generally doing your job”.
”That's what your salary is for,” he said. ”So from now on, we will award higher but fewer bonuses to those exceptional civil servants who are delivering, innovating and going above and beyond.”