Thousands of civil service staff to move out of London

Nearly 4,500 civil service jobs will be moved out of London and the South-east as part of the Government's plans to shift 20,000Whitehall officials to the regions by 2010.

Nearly 4,500 civil service jobs will be moved out of London and the South-east as part of the Government's plans to shift 20,000Whitehall officials to the regions by 2010.

Gordon Brown also told MPs he had cut civil service numbers by 9,000, the first reductions in a programme to cut a total of 84,000 government jobs.

Staff from four departments will be relocated. About 2,300 posts at the Department for Work and Pensions will move to Liverpool, Wrexham and Newcastle upon Tyne, while 1,230 Ministry of Defence staff will move to North Yorkshire. Six hundred officials at the Office for National Statistics will be moved to South Wales and 220 Inland Revenue and Customs staff will be moved to Liverpool, Bournemouth, Truro and Manchester.

Job losses include 6,000 posts cut at the Department for Work and Pensions, 300 posts cut at the Ministry of Defence, 800 at the Inland Revenue and Customs and Excise, 450 at the Department for Education and Skills and more than 700 at the Department of Health.

Union leaders attacked the cuts. Dave Prentis, general secretary of Unison, said: "Public services work best when the team works together. Stripping one part of it will affect the ability to deliver on the ground."

Mark Serwotka, general secretary of the Public and Commercial Services Union, said: "Once again we see the Government outlining grand plans but failing to realise you need people to deliver them."