“THE media sometimes portrays civil servants as overpaid bowler-hatted bureaucrats, but we are working people doing a very difficult job — often not a very popular one — implementing government policy, but we try to do a good job and treat people with respect.”

Fran Heathcote, president of the Public and Commercial Services (PCS) union, is busy preparing for the union’s three-day 2023 conference in Brighton, which kicks off today.

It’s been quite a year since the union’s last annual meet-up. A national dispute with the Tory government over several issues, including pensions, job security and redundancy terms, has grown increasingly bitter.  

But the stats behind arguably the most prominent concern — plummeting take-home pay — are particularly shocking.

Heathcote tells me that a whopping four in 10 Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) staff processing universal credit applications are either claiming the benefit themselves or are entitled to claim it.

The situation, which she describes as a “damning indictment” of Downing Street, comes amid wage offers of just 2 per cent, despite inflation topping a 40-year high of more than five times that since last August.

Heathcote, herself a DWP employee, warns that the worsening cost-of-living crisis is “really starting to bite” her members.

“The reality is 40 per cent are on in-work benefits or using a foodbank. In the two biggest departments alone, the DWP and HM [Revenue and Customs], pay fell below the national living wage last month.

“We recently surveyed our members and the stories are heartbreaking. There are people who can’t afford to switch on the heating or feed their kids, there are foodbanks in a fifth of DWP offices — these are government employees.

“Not that long ago they were clapped as key workers. The then-prime minister told us we were invaluable, and the country couldn’t manage without us during the Covid-19 pandemic. And what’s our reward?

“We were made the lowest offer anywhere in the public sector and unlike every other union that’s in dispute, not one minute of negotiations have taken place.

“Our members are getting a pretty raw deal at the moment. People feel enough is enough and they want to do something.”

The rising anger that led to 100,000 PCS members downing tools on February 1 shows no signs of abating. Earlier this month, a massive 88 per cent backed renewing the union’s six-month strike mandate on a 52 per cent turnout across 106 employers.

Despite DWP members overwhelmingly endorsing the move, turnout fell “about 500 votes short” of arbitrary Tory anti-worker thresholds, the union’s president says.

“It’s a setback, but the members in that group are furious we didn’t do it, and they’re determined to reballot again quickly.

“It’s because of the draconian anti-union laws — 90 per cent who voted backed more action.”

The national campaign will undoubtedly be the focus of this week’s conference at the Brighton Centre, Heathcote predicts.

The union’s innovative approach to industrial action, which combines small groups taking part in targeted action on behalf of all members with the big strike days such as that in February, is “really starting to have an impact,” she adds.

“The strategy reduces the impact on very low-paid workers because nobody takes strike action lightly — it is a sacrifice having to lose pay. But it supplements the days when we join other unions to take all-member action. It’s a campaign that the government is finding harder and harder to ignore.”

She blasts the “short-sighted” approach from Westminster, which is still claiming there’s no more money out there despite telling firefighters, teachers and NHS staff the same before suddenly finding more, presumably down the back of the sofa.

“I know the economic arguments are often made that it’s not affordable to give people a cost-of-living pay increase, but the reality is if you invest in the public sector and give people a living wage, they’ll spend it which will boost the economy.

“I’m no great mathematician, but it’s not that complicated. The money is there, it’s a choice about how it’s spent.”

The other big talking point on the south coast will undoubtedly be last week’s shock news that PCS general secretary Mark Serwotka plans to retire at the end of the year after nearly a quarter of a century at the top.

“Mark’s an inspirational figure, not just in our union but also across the whole movement,” Heathcote stresses. “He’s tirelessly run PCS for 23 years despite having very serious health issues.”

In a statement, the ex-TUC president, who had a heart transplant in 2016, said: “Taking into account what is right for myself, my family and the union, I have decided that now is the time to announce my retirement.”

“He said it’s the right time to go, but I think there are some people who wish he’d stay forever,” Heathcote jokes. 

“He’s been an inspiration to a whole generation of reps and activists and people have been really taken aback by the news. It’s the end of an era.

“But he’s not going immediately, and we need to make sure that the union takes forward his ideas and stays as strong, united and as well organised as it’s been under him.

“He deserves a happy retirement and we wish him well, but we are determined to take PCS forward as well as we can and make sure we give him a legacy to be proud of.”