Union warns of bank job losses

ANY consolidation or mergers in the Irish banking sector could bring about “serious job losses“, the Irish branch of trade union Unite has warned.

The UK head office of Unite, formerly the Amicus trade union, has warned the financial services industry in Britain that vast cuts in staff levels will only serve to deepen the ongoing economic crisis. Since the turn of the year, approximately 20,000 people in the financial sector in the UK have lost their jobs.

Unite’s UK national officer, Rob MacGregor said the union is “infuriated” that banks and insurance companies are “failing to recognise the damage that will be done to their businesses if they continue to simply slash thousands of staff each month.”

Mr MacGregor said the banking sector needs to protect staff if it is to have any chance of surviving the current economic crisis.

In Ireland, things haven’t been quite as bad for the industry – although Bank of Ireland has been one of the companies cutting jobs in the UK – but the warning signs are there, according to Jerry Shanahan, national officer for Unite here.

“We have been dealing with similar situations here, but we have avoided compulsory redundancies to date. Where there has been staff reduction, it’s either been through natural turnover, re-deployment or voluntary redundancy and we’ve been engaged with Government over the course of the last couple of months to ensure that government policy regarding the financial services sector doesn’t bring about the same level of job losses seen in the UK,” he said.

However, Mr Shanahan added: “If there was a move towards merging banks, it could result in serious job losses here. The banking sector here is in a kind of limbo because of the current situation and re-capitalisation and the potential for our banks to be nationalised.”

Indeed, Unite hasn’t been the only voice of concern on this note. In a research note on the future of the Irish banks, published only last week, Davy Stockbrokers said that efforts to restore the main banks here “to even modest profitability” by 2010 “will require some tough cost measures.”

“Restoring the banks to more meaningful profits, so that they can play a pivotal role in Ireland’s economic recovery will require more far-reaching cost initiatives,” the company said.