Tax officers vote for action

PCS members at HM Revenue and Customs have voted for industrial action in a dispute over job cuts and privatisation. The union’s 55,000 members oppose plans to cut a further 10,000 jobs by 2014-15, taking the total axed since 2005 to 30,000.

Reductions on this scale would fly in the face of concerns raised by the House of Commons Public Accounts Committee, which said recently that more than £1 billion more in tax could have been collected if HMRC had not cut so many staff.

Members are already on the receiving end of a two-year pay freeze. For the second year of the freeze a flat rate £250 consolidated increase was payable this month to staff on less than £21,000, with pay frozen above that level. There were also performance awards for staff on a “Top rating”, and a commitment to in-depth discussions on the future structure of the reward strategy for 2013-14.