New research shows that public sector employees in Scotland have received significantly larger pay rises than their counterparts across the rest of the UK, putting pressure on the Holyrood administration’s finances.
Analysis by the Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS) indicates that Scottish state employees have seen pay climb by 5 per cent above inflation since 2019, compared with no real-terms increase for public sector workers elsewhere.
These higher rates of pay have coincided with an 11 per cent expansion in the Scottish public sector headcount—equivalent to 56,000 extra staff since 2017—and have lifted the government’s annual wage bill to £27 billion. The state now employs 22 per cent of Scotland’s total workforce, versus around 17 per cent in England.
The IFS highlights several posts where Scotland’s pay outstrips that in other parts of the UK. A newly qualified teacher north of the border earns £33,594, roughly £2,000 more than the £31,650 offered in most of England. Newly qualified nurses start on £31,892 in Scotland, compared with £29,970 in large areas of England.
Jonathan Cribb, an IFS economist, says it is not clear the extra funds have translated into improved staff retention or productivity. “Scotland has not only increased the number of public sector workers more quickly than other parts of the UK, it has also increased their pay more quickly,” he said. “While these are reasonable priorities, it adds to the Scottish Government’s fiscal challenges, given that funding from the UK Government will not reflect these Scotland-specific decisions.”
Craig Hoy, a Conservative MSP, argues that higher rates of pay have become “frankly unaffordable,” with taxpayers seeing no real improvement in the value or quality of services. “There’s been no attempt by the SNP to rein in spending, to tackle waste on an industrial scale, or to improve public services,” he said.
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Scotland’s public sector pay outpaces rest of UK, driving up wage bill