Natural England staff secure vital pay agreement 

Prospect members working at Natural England (NE) have successfully negotiated a vital pay flex agreement which will address some of the structural problems in the pay system which are contributing to the recruitment and retention problems at the agency. 91% of members voted for the deal on a turnout of 83%.  

The agreement is a two-year pay deal which represents a 7% headline average rise in 2025/26 and 5.1% in 2026/27. The offer is designed to reduce the lengths of Natural England’s pay ranges and seeks to align terms and conditions both within Natural England and closer to those in the wider Defra group. Disparities in pay between NE and the rest of Defra have long been a problem with NE staff paid significantly less than counterparts elsewhere for similar roles and something which Prospect members have been campaigning on for several years to resolve. 

In order to secure the deal, which includes additional funding from Defra, some terms and conditions have been traded though the overall effect is broad alignment with the rest of Defra. Changes include a reduction in holiday entitlement from 33 (or 34.5 for some legacy organisation staff) to 30 days per annum with new starters beginning on 25 days and gaining an additional day’s leave per year up to 30days; an increase in the working week from 36 to 37 hours; and reductions in overtime pay. 

The agreement should help to: 

• Attract and retain talent by offering better salaries  

• Move colleagues up through their pay range to better reflect the knowledge, skills and experience gained through time in grade  

• help prepare the pay structure for the reintroduction of a lasting pay progression mechanism when pay remit guidance allows. 

• Maintain market competitiveness by benchmarking against Civil Service and public sector comparators. 

Steve Thomas, Deputy General Secretary of Prospect, said: 

“This is a very important agreement as it shows that there are mechanisms by which civil service employers can improve their pay structures even given the boundaries of the pay remit guidance. There are still a lot of improvements which could be made, by offering a genuine and enduring pay progression mechanism for example but this is still a huge step forward and one that other areas can learn from.  

“One of the main advantages of the new structure is that it will bring many staff who are stuck at the bottom of their pay scales onto a much more competitive level, rewarding service and improving incentives to stay with Natural England.  

“Pay flex cases can be slow and cumbersome and without significant reform cannot be a substitute for proper recognition of specialist civil servants. What they do show is that by working with unions employers can find innovative ways to reverse the decline in civil service competitiveness with the private sector.”