Norwich Union moves 2,350 jobs to India

Britain's biggest insurance firm is to cut 2,350 jobs under plans to “export” work to India, union officials were told today.

Aviva, which trades as Norwich Union, stunned workers by announcing that it will outsource work to Delhi and Bangalore next year.

Amicus said the announcement was “deplorable” and had given thousands of workers a Christmas present of an uncertain future.

Union officials warned of at least 500 compulsory job losses and said there was no guarantee that further cuts would not be made.

Workers across the UK were being given the news at briefings today and union leaders said they feared cuts at several locations, including Norwich, York and Perth.

Dave Fleming, national officer of Amicus, said: "This deplorable announcement by Aviva is based purely on greed. It ignores Aviva's corporate social responsibility towards its UK employees and customers because company turnover is overwhelmingly UK-based.

“With this announcement of job cuts coming hard on the heels of proposals to increase staff pensions contributions by 5%, Aviva have given these 2,350 employees a wonderful Christmas present of an uncertain future.

“They are throwing thousands of families on to the scrapheap for a 40% saving that will not be passed on to their customers.”

Amicus called on the company to reverse the “despicable” decision and said the union would back workers in “whatever course of action” they choose to take.

Aviva already employs 1,200 workers in Delhi and Bangalore and said its experience in India had been "positive''.

The outsourcing will affect a number of Aviva’s business units including Norwich Union Insurance and Norwich Union Central Services.

Amicus said the export of so many jobs would “seriously damage” the UK employment market, especially for school leavers and graduates.

“Offshoring” of jobs to India has grown this year and a number of UK firms now have centres there, including BT.

Unions have warned that up to 200,000 jobs in the finance sector could leave the UK over the next five years and move overseas, where labour costs are considerably cheaper.