Jobs in Castlebar may be under threat following the announcement that Aviva is shedding almost 1,000 staff throughout its Irish and European operations, due to the merging of Aviva Ireland with Aviva UK and the restructuring of its European regional operations.
The slashing of 950 jobs at the insurance company was announced to staff on Wednesday morning, following which Aviva staff voted on Wednesday evening in favour of industrial action. The job losses comprise 180 roles from Aviva Europe and 770 from Aviva Ireland — which includes job losses in the branch networks, and large centres in Cork, Galway, and in the Dublin headquarters.
The motion to conduct a ballot for industrial action was passed by a unanimous show of hands. This will commence after staff in other locations have been consulted and will be used to show that staff will fight to maintain the maximum number of high skilled, sustainable jobs. Another show of hands expressed a total lack of confidence in management.
One of Aviva’s 26 branches is located in Mayo. The office at Market Square, Castlebar, currently employs between four to five people.
Speaking to the Mayo Advertiser, the regional officer of Unite, Brian Gallagher — a union which represents, 1,300 staff at the company — said that jobs in Mayo could be at risk as all Aviva staff are still left in the dark as to where the cuts are coming from as there has been “absolutely no commitment given” from management in relation to where job losses will take place.
Overall, no jobs will be lost before March 2012 and the full implementation of the redundancy programme could take up to two years.
In a statement from Unite, issued on Thursday, Mr Gallagher said: “The axe has fallen harder and sharper than the worst fears of staff... but staff will not roll over and allow their jobs be taken away without justification of every change and agreement over the terms on which any redundancies are made.”
The trade union officer added: “Aviva remains immensely profitable and we will not accept compulsory redundancies; we will not accept a voluntary package below what our members deserve; we will not facilitate the removal of jobs from Ireland without negotiated agreement.”
Unite met with staff in Dublin and Galway and will meet with staff in Cork today (Friday ). A meeting with staff from the branch networks will take place at 8pm on Monday evening in Portlaoise.
