![Australian Taxation Officer commissioner Chris Jordan. Picture: Sitthixay Ditthavong Australian Taxation Officer commissioner Chris Jordan. Picture: Sitthixay Ditthavong](/images/transform/v1/crop/frm/fdcx/doc7axqufv96fm1kfkdzf8p.jpg/r0_273_5338_3286_w1200_h678_fmax.jpg)
Senior executives at the Tax Office will receive a pay rise after a freeze on wage increases lifted for high-ranking public servants.
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The Australian Taxation Office is giving senior executive level staff a 1.7 per cent pay rise, after the public service removed clamps on increases.
Officials from the agency overseeing the public service's workforce, the public service commission, told Commonwealth department heads on Friday the senior executive service pay freeze had been lifted.
The ATO's pay rise for senior executives, starting June 28, matches private sector wage increases in the year to June 2020.
An agency spokesperson said it had made no further decisions on annual pay increases.
Australian Services Union official Jeff Lapidos, who represents Tax Office staff, said the wage increases for senior executive staff were overdue.
"The decision to grant pay rises has taken far too long," he said.
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Mr Lapidos previously urged the government to reconsider its pay freeze for senior executive staff within the public service following nearly 12 months of "outstanding work" in response to the COVID-19 pandemic.
He argued that senior executives across the public service, especially those within the Australian Taxation Office, had taken on a difficult task and delivered the government's programs.
"Tax Commissioner Chris Jordan accepted the [government's COVID response] challenge and worked with the ATO's SES officers to implement these programs and new legislation in record time," Mr Lapidos said in a letter to the government.
Senior executive service public servants are employed under individual agreements that align with the government's bargaining rules.
The lifting of the freeze on senior executive wage increases follows the end of a temporary pause on pay rises for lower-ranked staff in the 12 months from April 2020.
In a separate decision earlier this month, the Remuneration Tribunal setting pay levels for department and agency heads said their salaries would remain unchanged in 2021-22 because of the uncertainty surrounding the economic recovery from Covid.
It is the second year the tribunal has awarded no pay rise to the most senior bureaucrats.
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