Defence civilians ballot on action over cuts

Defence civilians ballot on action over cuts

Prospect is to hold an indicative ballot of 7,000 members in the Ministry of Defence on industrial action over the lack of consultation on government plans to cut 25,000 civilian staff.

Cuts of almost one in three civilian defence posts were outlined in the Strategic Defence and Security Review.

Prospect national secretary Steve Jary said: “It is now three months since the announcement. Yet Prospect has still not had a letter from MOD describing its plans for the management of the surplus, no details of the targets which have been given to the 11 big budget areas in the department and no rationale for the reductions, other than that they are a political imperative.”

While MOD had acknowledged that it was in a pre-redundancy situation, it was refusing to operate its own redundancy agreement.

“Instead it has launched an early release scheme, which means there will be little opportunity to make informed decisions on which specialists it needs within the department to ensure it maintains its crucial intelligent customer role.”

Prospect believes this is unacceptable. MOD group President Alan Grey said the organisation had scored very badly on both leadership and change management in a staff survey a few months ago.

“With this insult, it is obvious that they have taken no notice. Can you imagine any other large employer treating its employees with such contempt?

“MOD civil servants have long been recognised as loyal to the armed forces. This commitment is being undermined by these cuts and by the way they are being pursued. Morale is already at rock-bottom and the department is making it worse.”

The ballot will begin in mid-February.


  • 26 Jan 2011