How firefighter pay is agreed: the NJC, FBU and ballots

The National Joint Council: who is in it

The National Joint Council for Local Authority Fire and Rescue Services is the negotiating body for Grey Book employees, which covers firefighters and control staff below brigade-manager level. Its circulars carry the names of two joint secretaries, one for each side. The 2026 pay circular, NJC/2/26, was signed by Sarah Ward as Employers' Secretary (with the Local Government Association's address at 18 Smith Square) and Steve Wright as Employees' Secretary, at the FBU's address in Gray's Inn Road, London.

The employers' side is often described as the National Employers for fire and rescue; the LGA publishes employers' circulars, such as EMP circular 4/26 on the 2026 Grey Book pay offer, alongside the NJC's own circulars. The employees' side is the FBU. Brigade managers have a separate body, the NJC for brigade managers, whose terms are known as the Gold Book, with its own 2026 pay award. This guide concerns the Grey Book.

The NJC's circulars are addressed to chairs of fire authorities, chief fire officers, chief executives or clerks and directors of HR, as well as NJC members. Services in England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland advertise NJC rates, as the Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland salary guides show.

How a pay award is made, step by step

The process has a recognisable shape, and recent years show it. The employees' side sets out a claim, and the LGA has published examples, such as the employees' side's NJC pay claim of 29 April 2021. The employers' side responds with an offer through an employers' circular. In 2025, for example, the offer was reported as 3.2% with removal of the trainee rate and further talks planned on pay progression; in 2026 it was 3.8%.

The FBU then puts the offer to its members. In 2025 members were consulted ahead of the union's annual conference, with the result expected before the end of May. In 2026 the FBU's consultative ballot concluded on 2 July 2026, and the union's circular of that date reported 54% accepting on a 68% turnout. Its Executive Council then confirmed the union would proceed and urged employers to apply the award to all Grey Book employees as a matter of urgency.

Finally the NJC issues the pay circular. NJC/2/26 is dated 3 July 2026 and lists the new rates in four appendices: firefighting roles, the retained duty system, control-specific roles, and non-operational staff and junior firefighters. A separate circular sets CPD payments by fire authority (NJC/3/26). Each fire and rescue service then implements the award through payroll, which is when arrears may arise; see firefighter pay rise back pay.

1. Claim or proposal: the employees' side sets out what it is seeking, informed by union conference objectives.
2. Offer: the employers' side issues an offer through an employers' circular, with the percentage and any other changes.
3. Consultation: the FBU consults members, for example through a consultative ballot, and its Executive Council decides how to proceed.
4. Agreement: if the offer is accepted, the joint secretaries sign an NJC circular giving the effective date and the new rates.
5. Implementation: each fire and rescue service applies the rates through payroll, paying arrears back to the effective date where necessary.

The 2026 round in detail

The FBU's 2 July 2026 circular records the sequence. Members voted by a majority to accept a 3.8% increase on all NJC basic pay rates and CPD payments with effect from 1 July 2026. It reports 54% for acceptance on a 68% turnout. The union then said it would move forward with the decision and urge employers to apply it urgently, while its negotiators continued detailed engagement through NJC structures to achieve an agreed programme of pay reform.

The circular describes the union's stated aims for that reform: a fairer and more transparent pay system, improved opportunities for career progression, greater consistency nationally and stronger recognition of skills, competence and development, in accordance with objectives set by FBU Conference. It also says the NJC Joint Secretaries would soon issue a revised circular containing newly agreed pay bandings. That is the union's account; the content of those bandings had not been published in the sources reviewed for this guide.

The NJC circular NJC/2/26 then applied the 3.8% award: a competent firefighter's £40,358 and a development firefighter's £31,539, with some rates for fire control operator equivalents and junior firefighters uplifted to comply with the National Minimum or Living Wage. For the numbers, see firefighter pay rise 2026 and pay scales 2025 vs 2026.

Consultative ballots, statutory ballots and strike rules

The 2026 vote was a consultative ballot: the union asking members whether to accept an offer. It is not the same as a statutory ballot for industrial action, which is regulated by law, requires specific notices, information and voting arrangements, and must be held before lawful industrial action. A consultative ballot has no legal thresholds of its own, which is why the 54% figure is reported with its turnout; a statutory ballot has legal thresholds.

The legal rules on industrial action ballots have been changing. The Employment Rights Act 2025 contains a group of provisions on industrial action ballots, including turnout and support thresholds, information in notices and voting papers, the period after which a ballot mandate ceases to be effective, and electronic balloting, and its commencement is staged. Because the position depends on which provisions are in force on a given date, this guide does not state current thresholds or notice periods. Acas guidance on industrial action and the legislation itself are the places to check.

Two other points are neutral background. Firefighters' own terms, including sick pay and working time, are in the Grey Book and are separate from pay negotiation. And the FBU is a trade union whose membership is voluntary; see FBU union membership for what it offers members.

What else the NJC does: the Grey Book and duty systems

The NJC does more than agree annual awards. It maintains the Grey Book, the Scheme of Conditions of Service, currently in its seventh edition (April 2025), and amends it by circular. The 2025 circular NJC/3/25, for instance, deleted the sentence in Section 2 that gave trainees the trainee rate of pay, and replaced the wording on notice periods. The 2024 agreement improved occupational maternity pay to 26 weeks at full pay followed by 13 weeks at Statutory Maternity Pay.

It also has a dispute-resolution route for working arrangements. Where a fire and rescue employer and recognised trade unions disagree over a proposed duty system that does not accord with the existing national systems, the Grey Book says either party can refer the difference to the NJC's Technical Advisory Panel, chaired by an independent expert appointed every three years and assisted by the joint secretaries. The panel seeks to broker agreement and otherwise makes recommendations, within one month unless the parties agree longer.

Local agreements sit alongside the national ones. London Fire Brigade's policy, for example, records local agreements that consolidated London weighting and older CPD payments into basic pay, and a 2022 local agreement on a 2% skills payment. The Scottish Fire and Rescue Service put its own pay proposal to the FBU in July 2019, which members rejected. National and local processes therefore run side by side, and your contract records which apply to you.

Why awards take effect on 1 July but pay arrives later

The effective date and the payment date are separate. The pay year for national awards starts on 1 July, but the agreement has to be reached, confirmed and processed by each service's payroll. In 2026 the gap was a matter of days: the ballot closed on 2 July and the circular is dated 3 July. In 2022 the award took effect on 1 July 2022 but the NJC circular confirming it (NJC/1/23) is dated 6 March 2023, so it was backdated by eight months.

For firefighters this means arrears are a normal feature of the system, and the size of the arrears depends on how long confirmation takes. A competent firefighter's 2026 rise is £123.08 a month gross, so each month of delay is worth that amount. The back pay guide explains how to calculate and check it, and firefighter pay rises history shows the timing for each year.

If your service has not yet applied the award, ask payroll in writing for the date. The payslip checker helps you see whether your pay matches the national figures.

What the FBU and employers say, and how to read it

Both sides make public statements, and it helps to separate facts from positions. The facts include the offer percentage, the ballot result and the rates in the circulars. The positions include the FBU's argument that current pay structures no longer reflect the skills, responsibilities and professionalism required of modern firefighters, and that it seeks a fairer, more transparent pay system. In 2025 the FBU's General Secretary said the increase would insulate firefighters from inflation for a year, but that inflation-level rises would not be enough in the long run to address what he described as a loss of about 12% in pay value since 2010.

The employers' side, for its part, described the 2025 change to remove the trainee rate as enabling all services to recruit directly onto the development rate, and raised concern about the national living wage overtaking the trainee rate for firefighters (control). Neither side's statements amount to an independent assessment of what pay should be, and this guide takes no position on the 2026 outcome.

For readers, the useful approach is to focus on what applies to you: your role and stage, the rates in the current circular, any local agreements and the dates. The firefighter salary UK 2026 guide has the current rates, and the paid Personal Pay Report gives a personalised summary. Nothing here is industrial-relations, legal or financial advice.