National Trust has revealed plans to cut almost 1,300 jobs amid the Coronavirus pandemic.
As the conservation body’s income was hit, the group has said it plans to save £100m a year through a new redundancy scheme.
The Trust has said that 514 people would be made compulsorily redundant, whilst 782 people have taken voluntary redundancy.
“It’s with deep sadness that we have to make redundancies. I certainly don’t want to stop any of the extraordinary work done by the people of the National Trust,” said the trust’s director, Hilary McGrady.
“No leader wants to be forced into announcing any redundancies, but coronavirus means we simply have no other choice if we want to give the charity a sustainable future.”
“But our consultation has done as intended. It provided proposals to reach our savings target, and sparked such thorough feedback and collective intelligence that we’ve been able to adapt our plans while still making the savings we needed. It’s been a difficult process with some very hard choices.”
“We have exhausted every other avenue to find savings, but sadly we now have to come to terms with the fact that we will lose some colleagues,” she added.
Mike Clancy, who is the general secretary of trade union Prospect, said: “Prospect understand the pressures the National Trust is under, but this is still a huge number of job losses and those redundancies will have a huge impact on the lives of all affected.
“The long-term prospects for the National Trust and access to its properties and lands are hugely important both to employees and to the cultural health of the nation.
“The current plan, while devastating for those who are losing jobs they love, is a reasonable way to move forward, minimising job losses while hopefully safeguarding the National Trust’s future.”