Of nearly 700 Public and Commercial Services Union (PCS) members who took part in the ballot, 63 per cent said they would be prepared to strike over cost-savings being introduced as part of the so-called "zero-based" review of the DfE, which will see 1,000 jobs cut from the department.
A PCS spokesman said the decision to enact a strike would depend upon how DfE management responded to the ballot outcome. He said that the union would put forward a timetable for action if their response was not “positive”.
The DfE published its review of internal operations in November last year. It outlined plans to reduce departmental administration costs by 50 per cent and cut around 1,000 jobs by May 2015.
The PCS has accused Education Secretary Michael Gove of using the department as “an ideological test-bed for wider civil service cuts”.
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