Staff who administer the pensions of 1.5 million existing and retired civil servants have voted overwhelmingly for industrial action as part of a campaign against plans to privatise their work, according to the union Public and Commercial Services (PCS).

Ministers want to turn the government agency My Civil Service Pension into what the PCS says could be "the first of many 'mutual' organisations".

The union says it is “privatisation by the back door with no genuine co-ownership, and the decision flies in the face of what staff say they want”.

In a ballot of the union's 250 members across MyCSP sites in Basingstoke, Cheadle Hulme, Liverpool, Newcastle and Worthing, 77% voted for a strike and 87% voted for other forms of industrial action, on a 46.5% turnout.

The PCS has consulted MyCSP staff in all the offices and the overwhelming view was that they do not want to go down this route, and want to retain their civil service status.

Ministers, the union said, have refused to allow this, which would mean staff would no longer have access to the civil service pension schemes they administer. But after pressure from the union, the proposed transfer date has already been put back to the autumn from June.

The strike vote comes a week ahead of the close of a ballot of more than 250,000 PCS members for a national strike over cuts to jobs, pensions and pay.

PCS general secretary Mark Serwotka said: "There is a severe deficit between the government's rhetoric about co-operation and mutualism and the reality of what is being imposed on staff who have made their views perfectly clear.

"This is privatisation by another name, as our members will be forced out of the public sector, with their civil service contracts ripped up, and we will do everything we can to oppose it."

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