Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:

To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, whether there will be compulsory redundancies from proposed closures in his Department's estate; and if he will make a statement.

Department for Work and Pensions future estate plans are designed to retain the skills and experience of colleagues across the country. As a result, it is proposed that the great majority of employees stay in the same building, with most other employees moving to another site nearby.

In a small number of cases relocation and redeployment may be more difficult. We will seek to relocate or offer alternative roles to all such employees. But in some cases, this may not be reasonable and redundancies may be required. At this point we are unable to confirm whether redundancies would be voluntary or compulsory.

The Department for Work and Pensions will be entering into a period of consultation with our colleagues at all affected locations and will be undertaking internal discussions about the options for relocation. It is important to stress that this is a proposal at this stage and we will make a final decision following the consultation process with our colleagues

It is not until this period of consultation is concluded that we will know exactly how many people may leave the Department as a result of these changes. Our current estimate is that this may be approximately 750 people, less than 1% of the overall workforce.