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Gloucestershire Press Release: Lloyds Announces Closure Of Entire C&G Branch Network
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Date: 9th Jun 2009
Lloyds Announces Closure Of Entire C&G Branch Network And Hundreds More Redundancies (Total Cuts: 1660)
Lloyds Banking Group has announced today that it is to close all 164 of its Cheltenham & Gloucester branches, with the jobs of all 928 staff being made redundant. The closures will take place on 6th November 2009.
In addition to C&G branch closures, further reorganisations and hundreds more job losses will take place across the Bank’s Mortgages business (also affecting its Halifax, Intelligent Finance and Scottish Widows brands) with many more to follow, including plans to operate from far fewer than its current 26 operational and support sites.
Further job cuts have also been announced today in other parts of Lloyds, as the Bank continues to remove overlapping and duplicated activities, following the merging of the HBOS and Lloyds TSB banks earlier this year. In all, 1,660 redundancies are being announced today.
These latest job reductions follow last week’s announcement of 510 redundancies in the Bank’s Retail Banking Division and bring to over five thousand the total number of job losses so far announced over the past two months as a result of the integration of the HBOS and Lloyds TSB banks. Many thousands more redundancies are expected, with some analysts predicting that over 25,000 jobs will eventually be slashed.
Concerns For Gloucestershire Based Jobs
LTU – the largest trade union representing staff working in the Lloyds Banking Group – is concerned about what future C&G’s Headquarters at Barnwood will have, now that it will no longer be supporting the C&G Branch Network. The C&G brand will almost certainly diminish in importance over time.
There are presently 1,200 staff employed in Barnwood, on the outskirts of Gloucester, across three buildings.
Though the Bank has said that it intends to maintain an ongoing presence in Barnwood – as well as in Halifax and Pendeford – there are no guarantees that anywhere near the same number of staff will be required at the operation or that the type of work carried out there will remain the same.
It is certainly likely that because the Bank intends to cut down from 26 the number of Mortgage operations sites in the UK, it could decide to close two of its three buildings in Barnwood. Just last week, the Bank announced the closure of its customer service centre at Medway with the loss of 210 jobs and has admitted that many more site closures will follow.
However, despite making thousands of jobs in the UK redundant, Lloyds’ top management remains committed to its ‘Jobs To India’ policy. It currently employs over 5,000 staff in low paid jobs in India, including 635 engaged directly supporting the Mortgages business. If it brought these jobs back to the UK, Lloyds could help safeguard the jobs in its Gloucester Mortgage operation.
It is wholly unacceptable that the Bank is refusing to return jobs to the UK, where it could help safeguard the jobs of its existing staff. Having propped up the Bank over recent months, Tax Payers will now also have to bear the burden of unemployment and social security costs that could be substantially reduced if the Bank returned work from India to the UK.
Union Comments
Steve Tatlow, Assistant General Secretary at LTU has said:
“This is a very sad day for Gloucester, as the C&G brand will lose its prominence and many staff working in the company’s branches and at the Barnwood Head Office their jobs”
"There is no justification for making C&G Branch Staff compulsorily redundant. There are Lloyds TSB and HBOS branches close to all C&G Branches and we are insisting that staff in those branches be invited to apply for voluntary redundancy before any C&G staff are made compulsorily redundant”.
"It is wholly unacceptable that at a time when Lloyds is planning to make redundant many thousands of staff working for C&G, Mortgages and in Head Office, it refuses to abandon its ‘Jobs to India’ policy. Lloyds should return immediately to the UK the thousands of jobs it has previously offshored to India, thereby reducing the scale of compulsory redundancies.”
"We are concerned for the future of C&G’s Barnwood operation. We have written to local MP’s and the Local Council asking that they join our call to the Government to use its 43% shareholding in the Lloyds Banking Group to insist that the Bank drop its ‘Jobs to India’ policy. This would help to protect the interests of Staff, the UK Economy and the Gloucestershire community which is at risk of suffering large job reductions”.
About Lloyds TSB Group Union (LTU)
Lloyds TSB Group Union (LTU) is the largest independent trade union representing staff working in the Lloyds Banking Group, with well over 40,000 members. In large parts of the Bank, LTU represents over 90% of all managers and staff.
For More Information
Full details on these job reductions are available at www.ltu.co.uk/newsletters/17.
If you would like more information, you should contact Steve Tatlow on 01234 262868 or email to SteveTatlow@ltu.co.uk.
Steve Tatlow
Assistant General Secretary
Lloyds TSB Group Union
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