Edinburgh City Council has unveiled plans to freeze the pay of 20,000 council staff to plug a £92m black hole in the council's finances. It is hoped the cost-cutting measures, which are being considered by city leaders, could save up to £22.9m. Council chiefs have already agreed to a 2.5% pay rise for all staff this year, but are now looking at a number of scenarios which could see non-teaching council staff facing a pay freeze in 2010-11, and the city's 3,400 teachers having their pay frozen in 2011-12. A council spokesman denied there were plans to cut pay but made no mention of pay freezes. He said: ‘There are currently no plans to discuss the issue of pay cuts for senior staff. However, difficult financial challenges lie ahead, and the position will be kept under review.' The head of Scotland's employers' organisation at COSLA, Joe Di Paola, confirmed the council would be involved in a country-wide consultation on pay matters in early July. John Stevenson, Unison branch president at the city council, said its members' would be ‘rightly angry' at the proposals.