Underpaid council workers across Britain will take to the streets today with nationwide protests over year-on-year cuts to real earnings.

Up to 1.6 million members of the Unite, GMB and Unison unions will mount protests over what leaders described as a Con-Dem bid to make "scapegoats" out of low-wage workers.

The unions have demanded pay rises of an extra £1.20 an hour and a promise from councils to pay at least the living wage, citing a three-year pay freeze since 2010 and a nominal raise of just 1 per cent last year - barely half inflation.