The Tax Office has put controversial pay rises for its highest paid executives on ice, blaming wider economic conditions for the move.

ATO boss Chris Jordan says the pay rises for his 'Senior Executive Service' are on hold until a pay deal with the Tax office's 19,000 rank-and file public servants can be resolved after three years of industrial strife.

Tax commissioner Chris Jordan, who resisted political pressure to improperly release new tax schedules. Credit:Louie Douvis

But peace seems a distant prospect, with one union opening up the new year with an aggressive legal move, taking the revenue agency to the Fair Work Commission, alleging breaches of the workplace bargaining rules.

Mr Jordan angered much of his workforce in December 2015 when he ordered the wage hike for senior executives just hours after a proposed pay deal, averaging 2 per cent a year, for tens of thousands of rank-and-file public servants at the ATO was crushed in a staff ballot by a margin of 85 to 15 per cent.