Restructuring events
European Restructuring Monitor (ERM)
The restructuring events database contains factsheets with data on large-scale restructuring events reported in the principal national media and company websites in each EU Member State. This database was created in 2002.
260 staff at the Driver and Vehicle Licensing Office in Coleraine, Northern Ireland, face either being redeployed across other sections of the Civil Service or being made redundant after it was announced that the work the office does will be moved to Swansea in South Wales. The government says it hopes most of the staff can be redeployed across different areas of the civil service. A Department of the Environment spokesperson said the changes would mean better services for motorists. The department said 90 staff could be moved to a different type of work which Driver and Vehicle Licensing Northern Ireland will begin handling at the same time. The Department of the Environment hopes that the remaining 103 permanent staff could be cut through redeployment across the civil service or retirement, but the fate of another 68 temporary employees is less clear.
Derek Smyth from the Nipsa union said staff were very upset.
'Staff here are shocked that so many posts could be on the line,' he said.
'To come back in the new year and to be told that your work is going over to the mainland has come as a shock.'
'To be honest, it is even too early yet for staff to be angry, they are going to have to go home and discuss it with their families.'
Politicians, including East Londonderry Member of Parliament Gregory Campbell and East Derry Social Democrat and Labour Party Assembly member John Dallat said the government must give the workers assurances.
Eurofound (2007), Driver and Vehicle Licensing Office, Relocation in United Kingdom, factsheet number 64736, European Restructuring Monitor. Dublin, https://dev.eurofound.europa.eu/restructuring-events/detail/64736.
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