Lloyds to cut 400 jobs in Scotland

Banking giant Lloyds is to axe up to 400 jobs in Scotland, it was announced today.

• Jobs in Edinburgh, Glasgow and Rosyth are set to be scrapped. Picture: PA

The bank is cutting around 4,500 jobs in the UK and overseas. This will take the total number of jobs axed since the start of last year to 20,000.

Posts will be scrapped in the IT and operations departments, with around 330 of the positions based in Edinburgh and the other 60 spread across Glasgow and Rosyth.

Cath Speight, national officer of the Unite union, said: "It is an absolute disgrace that Lloyds Banking Group, which is being kept alive by the taxpayer, is cutting more jobs and moving their jobs out of the UK.

"It is now time for the Government to step in and demand answers on behalf of taxpayers and staff. The announcement of 4,500 job cuts today lets down their staff, customers and the taxpayers with no acknowledgement of LBG's social responsibilities."

In Edinburgh 200 of the 330 posts to be cut are permanent positions.

A statement today from the bank said: "Lloyds Banking Group is committed to working through these changes with employees carefully and sensitively. All affected employees have been briefed by their line manager today. The group's union partners were consulted prior to this announcement and will continue to be consulted throughout the process.

"The group's policy is to use natural turnover and to redeploy people wherever possible to retain their expertise and knowledge within the group. By making less use of contractors and agency employees it reduces the impact on permanent staff."

A spokesman for Lloyds Banking Group said: "Three hundred and ninety roles in Scotland are affected by today's announcement. Around 60% are permanent posts and the remainder are part-time or contractual.

"This process, looking at which roles are needed and which roles overlap in the company, will take until the end of 2012.

"We have a turnover of staff of about 10% in Scotland and we employ 10,000 in the Edinburgh area.

"Compulsory redundancies are a last resort and some staff may wish to retire or take voluntary redundancy."

Lloyds said it had made "good progress" on its three-year integration programme which it said will be completed at the end of 2011, and was now putting in place its Group IT organisational structure for 2012.

The bank said 1,600 permanent roles will be affected across the UK, 1,150 temporary and contract staff will be "released" and a further 1,750 offshore contractor jobs will be cut.