The government's pay policy lacks transparency and coherence. As a PC I am pleased to be offered 2% as that is much better than the 1% I had expected but the government isn't fully funding the rise as 1% has to come from police force reserves and doesn't contribute to our pensions, and the other 1% has to come from current police budgets which are not being increased enough to cover the pay rise let alone inflation. Apparently our pay board recommended 2.8% but as the report hasn't been published I can only go on hearsay, but if that is the case then the government hasn't implemented their recommendation fully.
Their general attitude to public sector pay rises doesn't bear much scrutiny either. They say they are becoming more flexible about pay to address recruitment issues but although less people are applying to the join the police, recruitment is still generally quite strong. The NHS and judging from comments on PPRuNE the military are struggling to recruit but the government isn't doing anything about their pay yet.
The real winners from the governments flexibility will be MPs as their pay rises are linked to the average rise in the public sector the the more people the government gives rises to the higher the MP's pay rise will be. They received 1.5% and 1.4% in for their last two rises on top of the one off 11% three years ago.