Council employers are not much better than controversial Sports Direct retailer Mike Ashley, a trade union chief has complained.

The comments were made by UNISON head of local government, Heather Wakefield, following last week's decision by the three main council trade unions to settle pay talks with the Local Government Association (LGA).

Ms Wakefield defended UNISON's negotiating tactics, which included a joint mass walkout in August and a standalone decision to hold out for an still better deal in October, on the basis all three unions signed up to an improved offer from March's initial employer proposals.

‘The three unions have made clear that we don't believe that it's good enough, certainly far less than our members deserve, especially given that they are in their fifth year of pay restraint of pay cut' Ms Wakefield said.

She said the unions' campaign for significantly improved pay would continue, with an emphasis on raising the public profile of the contribution made by local government and schools staff.

‘We will be doing some serious campaigning around funding because the LGA's financial projections up until 2020 contain not a single word around local government pay,' Ms Wakefield told The MJ.

Ms Wakefield said: ‘If we are going to get some improvements, councils and the LGA have to stop putting their heads in the sand and start thinking now about funding.'

She added another £2.3bn went into town hall reserves this year, which she described a ‘sharp increase.  ‘We want to see some of that money put into our members pockets rather than going into banks,' Ms Wakefield added.

Ms Wakefield said 61% of town hall employees were part time and were exploited and facing cuts in pay, an area the union would conduct greater research ahead of systematic campaigning with councils and councillors.

She said council bosses were assuming that staff could continue bearing the impact of an ongoing squeeze on pay over the next Spending Review period.

‘We have reached saturation point as far as that approach to employment is concerned,' she said.

‘It's not Mike Ashley, but it's not much better,' she said – with reference to the controversial Sports Direct retailer - whose use of zero hours contracts for staff was recently attacked by Labour leader Ed Miliband.

‘The LGA has encouraged individual councils to cut conditions at local level, that has happened, and there is very little else that can be cut,' Ms Wakefield added.