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Unite, Britain’s biggest union, has accused Barclays of going back to its ‘old ways’ with a bonus pool of £2.4 billion while announcing plans to slash thousands of jobs.
 
7000 job losses in the UK businesses raises questions about how Barclays will maintain customer service standards. The cuts will heap further pressure on those who ‘survive’ to meet the increased demands on them for improved customer service.
 
Unite is calling on Barclays to ensure that it continues to meet these redundancies through voluntary means and the union would strongly oppose any attempts to make compulsory job cuts.
 
In a disappointing reversal of its recent trend, Barclays is to pay out £2.4 billion in bonuses, increasing remuneration significantly to its senior directors and highly paid investment bankers. This is in sharp contrast to the lowest paid workers at Barclays who start on £14,000 a year, after the bank acted to pay workers at least the national living wage. Thousands of staff at the bank who have worked for many years can typically earn between £16,000 and £20,000 a year.
 
Unite national officer, Dominic Hook said: “Despite claims there would be no return to its old ways, Barclays is increasing bonus pools for those already paid unimaginably high salaries. At the same time the bank continues to announce thousands of job losses for ordinary workers.
 
"There are big questions about how Barclays will maintain customer service standards as it cuts jobs and forces those workers that survive to be ever more productive.
 
"The retail bank is performing well so workers will be angry that they are bearing the brunt of the cuts. Unite will strongly oppose any attempts to make compulsory job cuts.   
 
“Rather than reward the very few at the top and plan to cut thousands more jobs, Barclays should have used today to give a copper-bottomed guarantee that it will not close 400 branches across the UK -  a quarter of its branch network."