Civil servants stage low-pay protest in North

Civil servants are staging a protest in Belfast today to highlight what they claim is the scandal of low pay in the Northern Ireland Civil Service.

Government employees earning the statutory minimum wage are demonstrating outside Belfast City Hall as their union , NIPSA, begins to ballot 20,000 civil servants on strike action over pay.

The public service union is urging its members to vote for an all-out indefinite strike over pay – a call which they say is unprecedented.

The union is balloting members in all the North's government departments and many public bodies after Secretary of State Peter Hain imposed a pay award before Christmas which had already been rejected by the union’s members.

Mr Hain said the deal, backdated to August, was worth 3.49%, but NIPSA insist it amounts to only 0.2% for the majority of civil servants.

The row over pay has been brewing for months and follows a similar wrangle and limited strike action over the 2004 pay deal.

The ballot is due to close on January 30. The union said if their strike call was answered by members and it went ahead, it would cause “massive disruption to vital public services across Northern Ireland”.

Thousands of staff in key areas are being balloted, including all Social Security Benefits staff and all Driver and Vehicle Test Centre workers, as well as those in Planning Offices, Water and Roads Services and Agriculture, including Meat Inspectors.

Union general secretary John Corey has branded Mr Hain’s imposition of the rejected pay deal as “disgraceful and deplorable”.

He said: “Northern Ireland Civil Service staff have been denied fair increases in rates of pay for the last three years.

“In fact, measured against inflation their pay rates have been cut by over 7%. Offering only a 0.2% increase for 2005 was derisory and insulting.”