A union is readying for industrial action while others have threatened to join in as negotiations for new workplace deals covering ACT government staff drag on 18 months after starting.
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The Health Services Union has applied to begin industrial action at Fair Work after the territory government's latest pay offer, which the union says would not meet rises in the cost of living.
Others including the Australian Workers' Union are also aggrieved by the pay offer and have threatened to take industrial action if the ACT government doesn't change its position on its four-year deal with maintenance staff.
The government has made several wage offers, and the latest would increase pay by 2.25 per cent from October 2017, 0.5 per cent from June 2018 and 1.35 per cent every six months from December 2018 to June 2021.
Unions say that across the life of the deals, workers would receive only slightly above 2 per cent wage rises annually, below projected increases in living expenses. The government's old workplace agreements expired last June.
HSU official Gerard Hayes said staff wanted pay rises that would keep up with the high cost of living in Canberra, but the ACT government offer wasn't adequate.
"We really don't expect that from a Labor government," he said.
"At this stage industrial action is a very live possibility."
The AWU, representing ACT Public Service staff responsible for removing litter, cleaning, maintaining grounds, parks, national parks and gardens, and bushfire fighting is seeking an annual pay rise of 4 per cent.
AWU NSW/ACT Secretary Daniel Walton said the government's latest offer was well below expectations.
“Our members are some of the lowest paid workers within the ACT, and they deserve a fair go from the territory government," he said.
ACT government general service officers represented by the union could receive between $44,000 and $91,000, depending on their pay grade, under the last round of pay rises. The salaries of health professionals were due to reach between $58,000 and $137,000, according to their band.
Australian Salaried Medical Officers Federation official Stephen Crook said it was also negotiating for a clause in its members' new agreement that would set hours preventing doctors burning out.
The new agreement needed to make the ACT a more attractive place to work for doctors so it could compete with other states, he said.
Sixteen meetings since November 2016 had led to little progress with the government, he said.
Professionals Australia, representing pharmacists, engineers, medical scientists and fire management professionals, is also unhappy with the government's offer.
Electrical Trades Union official Mick Koppie said negotiations had been slow.
"You have to line it up against a fixed object to see it moving," he said.
The ACT government said negotiations were continuing and that it had not opposed the HSU's application for a protected action ballot.
