Advocates for members of the Defence Force have condemned the annual pay increase servicemen and women will get for the next three years.

The Defence Force Remuneration Tribunal signed off on a deal with a 1.5 per cent increase for defence’s 57,000 full-time uniformed personnel and 20,000 reservists and the loss of some leave days and allowances.

National president of the Defence Force Welfare Association, David Jamison, said it was “insultingly low” and plans to write to Prime Minister Tony Abbott to ask him to intervene.

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“What the government is doing is destroying any level of trust between particularly the veteran community and the government itself because it’s totally changed its tune from opposition to government,” Mr Jamison said.

He said “it represents an effective pay cut for them” and “requires condemnation not applause”.

Mr Jamison said he does not want to criticise the chiefs of the ADF as the offer came from the government.

There is no formal avenue for an appeal against the tribunal’s decision and Assistant Defence Minister Stuart Robert said the government would not be upping the offer.

“We would always love to give more but I can only give what I’ve got in my hand and if there’s nothing in my hands there’s nothing I can give,” he said.

“Now I’ve got to find with the Minister for Defence and the Cabinet and the Prime Minister, $16 billion to fill the hole Labor left for us.”

Mr Robert said it won’t hurt defence recruitment.

“We say to those coming in there’s a salary. It’s generous. There’s an enormous number of allowances. There’s subsidised housing. There’s free ADF health care,” he said.

But Opposition Leader Bill Shorten said Mr Abbott should hang his head in shame.

“The government’s own budget papers reveal the funds for a fair pay deal had already been provided for,” he said in a statement.

The tribunal said the 1.5 per cent rise was less than in earlier agreements and likely less than inflation over the next three years.

But it said it was negotiated in circumstances requiring wages policy to be observed and for genuine productivity and efficiency gains to be identified and costed.

The pay deal comes into effect on November 4.