Cardiff Council Pay Scales 2026/27: Grades and Take-Home
Cardiff Council pay grades 2026/27 - salary, hourly rate on its 37-hour week and take-home after tax, NI and LGPS at every spine point.
Grades at a glance
From Salary Scales, effective 1 April 2026. Each grade covers a span of national spine points; the council decides the span, the NJC decides what each point is worth.
These are 1 April 2025 rates. Cardiff published them in a 2026/27 document, and the money is the national spine as it stood at that date. The 3.3% award for 2026/27 is backdated to 1 April 2026 and the national spine it produced was published on 24 August 2026, so an uplift and arrears are due on every figure below. We do not restate them here on the council's behalf - see the national spine for the 2026/27 points.
Local supplement: Cardiff's pay policy statement says it pays "either the Voluntary Living Wage hourly rate ... or the relevant Spinal Column Point, whichever is the greatest", and that a supplement "will therefore need to be paid to those employees on SCP 3,4 and 5 in 2026/27 until such a time as any pay award is agreed". The Voluntary Living Wage is £13.45 an hour (as announced in October 2025, the rate Cardiff's policy quotes), or £25,949 a year on a 37-hour week. Against the 1 April 2025 salaries in the table below, the supplement is worth up to £1,153 a year, at SCP 3, so staff receiving it are paid more than those rows show.
Do not add the supplement to the 2026/27 arrears. Because the rule is whichever is greater, the two do not stack. On the national spine from 1 April 2026, SCP 4 (£13.48) and SCP 5 (£13.70) are already above £13.45 an hour, and SCP 3 (£13.28) is £335 a year short of it. Read as written, that means pay on a supplemented point rises only by however far the new spine value exceeds £25,949, and not at all where it still falls short. The same paragraph says this "will be further reviewed once the 2026 National Pay Agreement is finalised, and any adjustment implemented". What Cardiff actually pays after that review is for the council to confirm on your payslip.
Cardiff does not use spine points 10, 13, 16, 18, 21. Those points exist nationally; this council simply does not place any grade on them.
| Grade | Spine points | Salary range | Hourly range |
|---|---|---|---|
| Grade 1 | SCP 3 | £24,796 | £12.85 |
| Grade 2 | SCP 4 | £25,185 | £13.05 |
| Grade 3 | SCP 4 to 6 | £25,185 to £25,989 | £13.05 to £13.47 |
| Grade 4 | SCP 6 to 11 | £25,989 to £28,142 | £13.47 to £14.59 |
| Grade 5 | SCP 11 to 19 | £28,142 to £32,061 | £14.59 to £16.62 |
| Grade 6 | SCP 19 to 25 | £32,061 to £36,363 | £16.62 to £18.85 |
| Grade 7 | SCP 25 to 30 | £36,363 to £40,777 | £18.85 to £21.14 |
| Grade 8 | SCP 30 to 34 | £40,777 to £45,091 | £21.14 to £23.37 |
| Grade 9 | SCP 34 to 37 | £45,091 to £48,226 | £23.37 to £25.00 |
| Grade 10 | SCP 37 to 40 | £48,226 to £51,356 | £25.00 to £26.62 |
- The scale is headed "NJC for Local Government (as at 1st April 2025)" - Cardiff republished the in-force spine in its 2026/27 statement rather than a new one, because the 2026/27 award was still unresolved when it published. It settled in August 2026 and the uplifted spine followed on 24 August, so this document has not caught up.
- Grades overlap: the top point of one grade is usually the bottom point of the next.
- Chief officers are on the separate JNC scale, up to £208,116 for the Chief Executive, and are not part of this structure.
Every point, and what it nets
Take-home assumes Wales, the 2026/27 tax rules, full-time hours and LGPS membership in the main section. The pension band steps up as pay crosses £29,001, £47,301, £59,801 and £84,001, which is why take-home flattens at those points.
| Grade | SCP | Annual | Hourly | LGPS | Take-home | Per month |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Grade 1 | 3 | £24,796 | £12.85 | 5.8% | £20,222 | £1,685 |
| Grade 2 / Grade 3 | 4 | £25,185 | £13.05 | 5.8% | £20,484 | £1,707 |
| Grade 3 | 5 | £25,583 | £13.26 | 5.8% | £20,752 | £1,729 |
| Grade 3 / Grade 4 | 6 | £25,989 | £13.47 | 5.8% | £21,026 | £1,752 |
| Grade 4 | 7 | £26,403 | £13.69 | 5.8% | £21,305 | £1,775 |
| Grade 4 | 8 | £26,824 | £13.90 | 5.8% | £21,588 | £1,799 |
| Grade 4 | 9 | £27,254 | £14.13 | 5.8% | £21,878 | £1,823 |
| Grade 4 / Grade 5 | 11 | £28,142 | £14.59 | 5.8% | £22,476 | £1,873 |
| Grade 5 | 12 | £28,598 | £14.82 | 5.8% | £22,783 | £1,899 |
| Grade 5 | 14 | £29,540 | £15.31 | 6.5% | £23,252 | £1,938 |
| Grade 5 | 15 | £30,024 | £15.56 | 6.5% | £23,576 | £1,965 |
| Grade 5 | 17 | £31,022 | £16.08 | 6.5% | £24,242 | £2,020 |
| Grade 5 / Grade 6 | 19 | £32,061 | £16.62 | 6.5% | £24,936 | £2,078 |
| Grade 6 | 20 | £32,597 | £16.90 | 6.5% | £25,294 | £2,108 |
| Grade 6 | 22 | £33,699 | £17.47 | 6.5% | £26,031 | £2,169 |
| Grade 6 | 23 | £34,434 | £17.85 | 6.5% | £26,522 | £2,210 |
| Grade 6 | 24 | £35,412 | £18.35 | 6.5% | £27,175 | £2,265 |
| Grade 6 / Grade 7 | 25 | £36,363 | £18.85 | 6.5% | £27,810 | £2,318 |
| Grade 7 | 26 | £37,280 | £19.32 | 6.5% | £28,423 | £2,369 |
| Grade 7 | 27 | £38,220 | £19.81 | 6.5% | £29,051 | £2,421 |
| Grade 7 | 28 | £39,152 | £20.29 | 6.5% | £29,673 | £2,473 |
| Grade 7 | 29 | £39,862 | £20.66 | 6.5% | £30,147 | £2,512 |
| Grade 7 / Grade 8 | 30 | £40,777 | £21.14 | 6.5% | £30,759 | £2,563 |
| Grade 8 | 31 | £41,771 | £21.65 | 6.5% | £31,423 | £2,619 |
| Grade 8 | 32 | £42,839 | £22.20 | 6.5% | £32,136 | £2,678 |
| Grade 8 | 33 | £44,075 | £22.85 | 6.5% | £32,962 | £2,747 |
| Grade 8 / Grade 9 | 34 | £45,091 | £23.37 | 6.5% | £33,640 | £2,803 |
| Grade 9 | 35 | £46,142 | £23.92 | 6.5% | £34,342 | £2,862 |
| Grade 9 | 36 | £47,181 | £24.46 | 6.5% | £35,037 | £2,920 |
| Grade 9 / Grade 10 | 37 | £48,226 | £25.00 | 6.8% | £35,619 | £2,968 |
| Grade 10 | 38 | £49,282 | £25.54 | 6.8% | £36,322 | £3,027 |
| Grade 10 | 39 | £50,269 | £26.06 | 6.8% | £36,979 | £3,082 |
| Grade 10 | 40 | £51,356 | £26.62 | 6.8% | £37,767 | £3,147 |
Basic pay only. Excludes overtime, unsocial hours, market supplements and any local allowance, and assumes no student loan.
How the hourly rate is worked out
The rule comes from the NJC circular: divide the annual salary by 52.143 weeks, which is 365 days divided by 7, then by 37 hours. Councils that use a shorter full-time week publish higher hourly rates for the same annual salary.
The 2026/27 award
The 2026/27 award settled at 3.3%, backdated to 1 April 2026, and it took five months. The national employers offered it on 24 March 2026 as a full and final offer; Unite, GMB and UNISON all rejected it and the employers declined to reopen negotiations on 9 June 2026. UNISON's industrial action ballot then missed the turnout threshold, and UNISON and GMB both accepted, as GMB's noticeboard recorded on 21 August 2026. Acceptance by two of the three unions is enough for a joint union position; Unite had not announced a final position.
The national spine those salaries sit on was uplifted and published on 24 August 2026. The salaries above are the ones Cardiff has published, at 1 April 2025, so the increase is owed on top of them as backdated arrears until the council restates its own document.
The full picture, including the spine itself and how the round played out, is on our NJC pay scales page.
Frequently asked questions
What is the lowest pay grade at Cardiff?
Grade 1, at spine point 3. From 1 April 2026 the national spine pays that point £25,614 a year, which is £13.28 an hour on the council's 37-hour week. Cardiff's own published scale shows the 1 April 2025 figure of £24,796 (£12.85 an hour), which the backdated 2026/27 award replaces. Cardiff also pays a Voluntary Living Wage supplement on this point, explained on this page, which does not stack with the award. Spine point 2 was deleted on 1 April 2026.
Are Cardiff pay scales the same as other councils?
The money on each spine point is, because the National Joint Council sets it nationally. The grades are not: Cardiff decides through its own job evaluation which points each grade covers, so the same job title can sit in a different grade at the council next door. Compare spine points, not grade letters.
What is take-home on £24,796 at Cardiff?
About £20,222 a year, or £1,685 a month, after Income Tax, National Insurance and a 5.8% LGPS contribution. The LGPS is a net pay arrangement, so the contribution reduces the pay you are taxed on but not the pay your National Insurance is charged on.
When do Cardiff pay scales go up?
The 2026/27 NJC award settled at 3.3% in August 2026, backdated to 1 April 2026, so an uplift and arrears are due. The national spine it produced was published on 24 August 2026; the figures on this page are the ones Cardiff itself published, at 1 April 2025, because we do not restate a named council's scale on its behalf. The national 2026/27 points are on our NJC pay scales page.