PM sets stage for May poll with pay freeze

The Prime Minister was accused of insulting senior staff in the civil service, NHS and across the public sector yesterday after he announced the plans for wage freezes to save 3bn over three years.

Senior civil servants, NHS managers, judges, military top brass, GPs and dentists will all have their pay frozen as part of the cost-cutting proposals.

Mr Brown said it was important that senior staff in the public sector showed leadership in the exercise of pay restraint during the current economic climate.

But the announcement was criticised by unions and professional groups, with one manager calling it "gesture politics".

Paul Noon, general secretary of the Prospect union, said: "There is a glaring contrast between MPs who have just awarded themselves 1.5 per cent and the harsh treatment meted out to the Government's own staff.

"Prospect members will draw their own conclusions at the fairness of a policy which rewards the politicians while cutting the real pay of their staff."

Jon Restell, chief executive of Managers in Partnership, which represents NHS managers, said: "This announcement is another chip away at the motivation of senior managers in the NHS.

"We know that these are tough times for the British economy, and we know that senior managers must shoulder some responsibility. We hoped for fair treatment but got gesture politics."

The Prime Minister said the Government had decided to accept some, but not all, of the Senior Salaries Review Body's recommendations.

A recommendation that the minimum pay for senior civil servants should increase to 61,500 and NHS managers earning less than 80,000 should have a 2.25 per cent rise were among those rejected.

He also announced that the Budget – to be held on March 24 – would set out in greater detail how the Government would tackle the 178bn deficit. His comments were dismissed by the Tories, who have said they would begin spending cuts this year, with Shadow Foreign Secretary William Hague, who is MP for Richmond, warning that another five years of Labour would be a "catastrophe" for Britain.

In a speech to an audience in the City, Mr Brown said that he had the character to lead the country through to economic recovery.

He said: "It is for other people to judge but I believe that character is not about telling people what they want to hear but about telling them what they need to know.

"It is about having the courage to set out your mission and the courage to take the tough decisions and stick to them without being blown off-course, even when the going is difficult."

He said that freezing the pay of senior civil servants, military top brass, judges, and doctors, dentists and senior managers in the NHS for 12 month from April would help to save more than 3bn by 2013-14. However, he also warned that the economy's recovery was still too weak to begin serious belt-tightening.

His argument was dismissed by Mr Hague who said that Britain could not afford another five year's of Labour's "debt, waste and taxes" which would take the country "backwards towards a 1970s style model".

He added: "Five more years of Gordon Brown would mean that this country would be associated across the world with risky and unaffordable debt, lack of discipline over spending and trade union power."

Liberal Democrat Treasury spokesman Vince Cable said that Mr Brown was attempting to play a weak hand over the economy.

He said: "It's very difficult to see how the man who claimed to have abolished boom and bust can campaign on his stewardship of the economy after the greatest bust for decades."