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Tax offices to close across Wales with fears for hundreds of jobs Tax offices to close across Wales with fears for jobs
(35 minutes later)
All tax offices in Wales are to close with a new regional centre opening in Cardiff employing up to 3,800 staff. All tax offices in Wales are to close with staff expected to transfer to Cardiff or north west England.
Staff have been told of the changes at Her Majesty's Revenue and Customs (HMRC), amid fears hundreds of jobs could be lost. Her Majesty's Revenue and Customs is shutting more than a hundred offices to be replaced by new regional centres, with up to 3,800 employed in Cardiff.
The existing sites in Cardiff, Swansea, Wrexham, Merthyr and Porthmadog would close, the document says. Offices in Wrexham, Swansea, Porthmadog and the present Cardiff base at Llanishen will close. An office in Merthyr is already due to shut in 2016.
350 staff are currently in Wrexham, 300 in Swansea and 20 in Porthmadog. The PCS union said the plans were "devastating" for HMRC and its staff.
Plaid Cymru leader Leanne Wood said it was "really bad news". HMRC Chief Executive Lin Homer said the organisation had "too many expensive, isolated and outdated offices".
She told the Jason Mohammad programme on BBC Radio Wales: "The loss in jobs in places like that with population centres that are quite small relatively speaking, has a much bigger impact than it would in areas of a bigger size where it would still be a huge problem, so I'm very very concerned about these HMRC cuts." "This makes it difficult for us to collaborate, modernise our ways of working, and make the changes we need to transform our service to customers and clamp down further on the minority who try to cheat the system."
"What is demonstrates is that we need a stronger voice from Wales." It currently has around 3,500 staff in Wales, with 2,800 in Cardiff, 350 in Wrexham, 300 in Swansea, and 20 in Porthmadog, where Welsh language services are based.
'Significant threat'
HMRC said staff will be given "a range of options and will have time to consider and discuss their future" with the organisation, but it stressed it expected to employ fewer people in total.
Staff from Wrexham would be expected to relocate to across the border to Liverpool, while the BBC understands the Welsh-language services will relocate from Porthmadog to Cardiff.
PCS general secretary Mark Serwotka said: "No one should be in any doubt that, if implemented, these proposals would be absolutely devastating for HMRC and the people who work there.
"Closing this many offices would pose a significant threat to the operation of HMRC, its service to the public and the working lives of staff.
"The need for parliamentary scrutiny of the plans is undeniable and urgent."
Plaid Cymru leader Leanne Wood told the Jason Mohammad programme on BBC Radio Wales she was "very concerned" about the tax office closures.
"The loss in jobs in places .... with population centres that are quite small relatively speaking, has a much bigger impact than it would in areas of a bigger size where it would still be a huge problem," she said.