The UK’s biggest trade unions threatened further strikes after the government offered below-inflation pay raises for some 2.5 million public-sector workers, signaling growing unrest over a cost-of-living crisis.
Unions representing teachers, doctors and other public sector workers said they will ballot their members about taking industrial action. Unison described the award for National Health Service staff as “short-sighted” and a “big mistake,” while the GMB union called it “another kick in the teeth” for the NHS that will turn the current “staffing black hole” into a “gaping chasm.”
