Unions are threatening strike action over cuts that include the closure of a Braintree social security office.

The benefits processing office in Panfield Lane, Braintree will close by next summer as part of what the Department of Work and Pensions (DWP) says is a national four-year programme to focus on customer needs and cut costs.

The department added the closure will not affect facilities for the unemployed at Braintree job centre.

But the Public and Commercial Services Union (PCS) said 287 jobs were at risk due to the closures of benefits processing centres in Braintree, Southend and Stevenage, and that 2,000 jobs across the UK could be lost.

A total of 37 social security offices and Job Centres will be shut nationwide under the proposals, which were announced yesterday by Work and Pensions Secretary Alan Johnson.

Mark Serwotka, PCS union general secretary, said he believed the announcement was the first tranche in the decimation of services provided by the DWP.

He said: "Workers will be angry, worried and extremely concerned about their future." The union said it would be seeking an urgent meeting with Mr Johnson.

Almost 300,000 civil servants across the country will be balloted next month on whether to take industrial action on November 5.

There are 53 people employed at the Panfield Lane site, and efforts will be made to redeploy them into different areas within the DWP.

Natalie Jones, press officer for the DWP regional press office for the east of England, said: "People are not going to be made redundant.

"We will look at people being redeployed into different jobs or relocated, but if there are redundancies we will make sure these are a last resort."

She said this closure would not affect the operation of the Job Centre Plus in Fairfield Road.

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