Lloyds Bank axing 15,000 staff

Lloyds Bank today delivered more devastating jobs news, revealing it will shed 15,000 staff by 2014.

It aims to save £1.5 billion a year by trimming its 104,000-strong workforce. More than 1,400 staff work for Lloyds Banking Group's Birmingham Midshires arm, Wolverhampton' biggest private sector employer.

Lloyds inherited the Pendeford-based specialist savings and mortgages business when it took over HBOS in 2008.

Today the 41 per cent state-owned banking giant said it could give no indication about what impact the job cuts might have on the Wolverhampton operation.

The huge round of job cuts was unveiled by new chief executive Antonio Horta-Osorio as part of his strategic review for the taxpayer-backed lender.

The latest cull will bring total job losses at the bank to more than 40,000 since the group was formed in the merger of Lloyds TSB and HBOS.

Pledging to create a more "agile" organisation, Mr Horta-Osorio said the majority of the job cuts were likely to be in middle management and back office roles.

Lloyds said none of its 650 branches would close and it would also look to use natural wastage – not replacing employees when they leave – and moving staff around rather than redundancy.

But the Unite union said the review will cause "deep distress and anxiety" across the company.

Mr Horta-Osorio, the Portuguese-born banker, said: "We have to do this. This bank has lost money."