Teachers, nurses and servicemen are among the key workers in line for pay rises once the public sector cap is lifted this week.
The end of the freeze will benefit as many as 5.6 million people, and a further two million are set to enjoy a boost in wages from the increase in the national living wage.
Chancellor Rishi Sunak is expected to confirm both measures in tomorrow’s autumn budget.
He indicated the public sector measure was a reward for those who kept vital services running over the Covid pandemic.
The cost of living has risen considerably recently with the 1.25 percentage point increase in National Insurance, and higher costs of gas and fuel.
The amount that public sector workers including NHS staff and police officers stand to gain is to be decided.
Pay for most frontline workforces is set through an independent review body which makes recommendations to ministers.
Officials said the government would be requesting ‘full recommendations’, with awards to be announced next year.
Kevin Courtney of the National Education Union said it meant there was ‘no prospect of clarity’ for public workers until 2022.
He said the chancellor ‘must make good on this latest pledge to drive up pay for those who kept this country on its feet throughout the pandemic’.
Unison union general secretary Christina McAnea said the pay freeze would continue ‘in all but name’ unless Whitehall departments were given extra money by Mr Sunak to fund the wage increases.
Royal College of Nursing general secretary and chief executive Pat Cullen said the lifting of the pay freeze was ‘tacit acknowledgement from ministers they have underpaid nursing staff’.
Many public sector workers were given yearly pay rises of only 1% throughout David Cameron’s six-year Tory austerity government from 2010.
MORE : National living wage to rise to £9.50 an hour as part of autumn Budget
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