Battle for pay rise? (4,3)
I believe the answer is:
wage war
'rise?' is the definition.
The definition and answer can be both related to competing as well as being verbs in their base form.
Perhaps there's a link between them I don't understand?
'battle for pay' is the wordplay.
'battle' becomes 'war' (I've seen this before).
'for' means one lot of letters go next to another (I've seen this in other clues).
'pay' becomes 'wage' ('wage' can be a synonym of 'pay').
'war' after 'wage' is 'WAGE WAR'.
(Other definitions for wage war that I've seen before include "industrial dispute?" , "campaign" , "Conduct hostilities" .)