11:09am Friday 29th February 2008
By Tyrone Marshall
Further job cuts in the civil service across the Fylde coast look set following a Government announcement yesterday.
The Department of Work and Pensions (DWP) announced their three-year business plan for the country, which will see a further 12,000 job cuts nationally, mostly in the Jobcentre Plus service and the Pensions and Disability and Carers Service.
Martin Jones, the chair of the Fylde central benefits and services branch, said: "We had said all along that there will be further announcements of job cuts over the next few months and this is the case.
"There is a high concentration of Disability and Carers Service in the Fylde at Warbreck and Norcross and the figures quoted above could mean up to a third of the DWP jobs in the area being cut."
Branch secretary Duncan Griffiths added: "Over 1500 jobs have been cut and the remaining members want an end to all the job cuts, uncertainty and additional workloads that they inherit.
"Instead they have been threatened by the prospect of further drastic levels of job cuts.
"The Lytham site may not have any DWP staff on it after April 21 and the Norcross site is around a third empty."
The announcement in 2004 that 104,000 civil service staff were to lose their jobs runs until the end of March, and the last of the civil servants working at the Moorland Road site, which once employed 2,500 people, are to leave their offices on April 21.
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