The Department for Work and Pensions has announced plans to close nine regional offices at locations ranging from Scotland to the West Country.
PCS, which is the civil service’s biggest union, said the decision – briefed to departmental officials yesterday morning – would put more than 5,400 staff at risk of redundancy or “forced relocation”.
The bases DWP is looking to exit by September next year are “service and support centres”, which host back-office functions and are not customer-facing.
They are: Blackpool Peel Park; Derby Holborn House; Glasgow Northgate; Halifax Dean Clough Mills; Hyde Beech House; Liverpool Belle Vale; Motherwell Johnstone House; Sunderland Wear View House; and Torquay Cotswold House.
In some instances, staff will be relocated to new offices in the same town or city. That is the case for officials at Blackpool Peel Park and Sunderland. Staff at Glasgow Northgate and Motherwell will be relocated to Atlantic Quay in Glasgow.
Officials based at Halifax are scheduled to relocate to Quarry House in Leeds, while DWP staff at Derby are facing a move to Nottingham Pearson Building.
Workers at Hyde are earmarked for relocation to Stockport Millenium House; counterparts at Liverpool Belle Vale are being moved to Bootle Redgrave Court.
PCS said it was particularly concerned for the future of the 130 staff based at Torquay Cotswold House, as there are no other DWP service and support centres in the vicinity.
The union, which is currently fighting compulsory redundancies affecting members in Lincoln, said it will oppose any office closures that remove secure civil service jobs from local communities.
General secretary Fran Heathcote said DWP’s latest plans were being presented as “modernisation” but spelled “uncertainty, longer journeys, disruption to family life and the very real risk of losing their jobs” for staff.
“DWP has had years to modernise its estate, yet staff continue to work in poor-quality buildings while being asked to pay the price for the department's cost-cutting agenda,” she said.
“PCS fundamentally opposes these office closures, and any further closures of service centres or jobcentres that would remove jobs from communities.”
Transformation minister Andrew Western told parliament yesterday that DWP has reduced the number of service and support centres it operates from 127 to 74 over the past five years.
He said the downsizing had delivered “net recurrent cashflow savings of £72.2m between 2022-23 to 2024-25, with significant further savings expected in future years”.
“With hybrid working now well-established, capacity across the estate exceeds requirements and is under-utilised by around a third,” he said.
Western insisted that the latest service and support centre closures were not about reducing the size of DWP’s workforce.
“These changes are not driven by a plan to reduce headcount,” he said. “We are committed to treating all affected colleagues with fairness and respect, giving them sufficient notice of any changes to where they work. Most will be offered a move in their current role to a nearby location where this is reasonable. Where relocation is not possible, redeployment within DWP or across other government departments will be the priority.”
A DWP spokesperson said the department’s plans were part of measures to consolidate the department’s estate to make it “smaller”, “more effective” and “deliver better value for money for the taxpayer”.
“Through this transition we have been focusing on supporting our staff, with redeployment within the department or in other government departments our first priority,” the spokesperson said.
“There is no face-to-face customer contact at the affected sites, and Jobcentres and the other vital services we deliver to customers are unaffected.”
DWP said voluntary redundancy would only be considered as a last resort, after redeployment options have been fully explored.
PCS argues that modern technology and hybrid working mean there is no justification for staff losing their jobs when work can be carried out remotely.