BT job cuts ‘could hit research’

Plans by telecommunications company BT to axe 13,000 jobs could cripple research at one of the UK’s biggest investors in science, the Prospect trade union has warned.

Over the next three years, BT will cut around 13,000 “mainly back office and middle management roles”, the company said on 10 May as it reported a 1 per cent fall in revenue in the year to 31 March. The cuts are part of plans to cut costs by £1.5 billion over three years and increase profits.

“Many of the roles that BT is proposing to cut are highly skilled professionals and the loss of that expertise could impact BT’s research and innovation capability,” Prospect’s national secretary Philippa Childs said in a statement. She said the scale of the cuts could affect BT’s remaining employees and “could lead to work being pushed down to employees in lower grades”.