Public sector workers should rein in their pay demands to avoid a repeat of 1970s style hyper-inflation, a Tory Minister has declared.
Simon Clarke, the chief secretary to the Treasury said that workers should not expect big pay rises as that would lead to spiralling inflation and even higher prices for goods.
With inflation already running at ten per cent other key workers are expected to follow striking railway workers in demanding wage rises that keep up with the cost of living.
In Scotland, where the SNP government runs most public sector services, the Unite trade union has already recommended rejection of the Scottish Government’s five per cent pay offer to NHS staff.
A GMB ballot has already begun that could see Scottish council workers take strike action unless local government bosses increase pay by more than two per cent.
The EIS teaching union is also threatening industrial action in the autumn over working conditions amid warnings from Scottish Finance Secretary Kate Forbes she intends to keep a tight grip on public sector pay.
The UK Treasury Secretary Simon Clarke warned on Monday that if pay rises in line with inflation there could be a repeat of the “destructive” 1970s cycle of rising inflation.
Ahead of the looming railway strike, he said voters had to have “a realistic expectation around pay”.
He added: “We enormously value the work of our public sector workers, our society could not function without them.”
“But it is equally important that we look at this from the point of view of what is in everyone’s interest which is that inflation does not get a grip as it a way did in the 1970s and it was absolutely destructive.”
“In the current landscape of inflation at nine per cent bordering ten per cent, it is not a sustainable expectation that inflation can be matched in payoff.”
The 1970s saw widespread strike action across both public and private sectors as workers demanded higher wages amid climbing inflation rates.
RMT union leaders have accused the Tory government of “inflaming” tensions over the rail dispute ahead of several days of travel chaos because of train strikes this week.
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