AROUND 45 redundancies have been announced this week at the National Nuclear Laboratory at Sellafield.

It is part of a 10 per cent staff reduction across NNL’s UK workforce which numbers 900 and has emerged from a review of costs across the organisation.

Of the 90 jobs to go, it is thought 45-50 will be from NNL’s Sellafield and Workington facilities. At Sellafield 408 are currently employed, and at Workington, 104.

It is understood the organisation is looking to save £5million and hopes to achieve the job cuts on a voluntary basis, though compulsory redundancies have not been ruled out. It will be consulting formally with staff and trade unions.

The union says it does not accept the reduction. “Some of the staff are permanent but quite a few are agency staff and we have been arguing that more of the agency staff should be made permanent, so to reduce permanent staff numbers is not acceptable. We don’t accept the need for it; there is no logic,” said Steve Gibbons of Unite.

“The bulk of the work is here, so the local workforce would be worst hit.”

Of the proposed 90 jobs reduction, 65 are permanent, the rest are agency staff.

NNL said yesterday: “The review has revealed the need to reduce payroll costs. We have therefore initiated a cost reduction programme which is likely to reduce overall headcount numbers, while ensuring we retain the expertise we need to respond to our future challenges and opportunities.”

Sellafield is the NNL’s largest facility in the country. There are other smaller ones, including Warrington, which employs, 180.

“NNL is world-leading but also expensive in terms of building and staff costs. This is a restructuring to ensure we have the right skills and the right people in the right places,” said the spokesman.