Hundreds of ambulance workers sent notices of redundancy

The letters will be fired off by the Yorkshire Ambulance Service giving certain formal notice of redundancy if employees do not find other jobs in the service or elsewhere by March next year.

They will be sent to staff in management, administrative and support roles with employees from the whole of the Yorkshire region, including York and North Yorkshire, potentially affected.

Acting chief executive Simon Worthington said the move was part of the ambulance trust's restructuring process which began when it was established last July.

But ambulance bosses have been heavily criticised by union leaders for sending out the notices so close to Christmas.

Glen Gears, secretary of the York branch of public services union Unison, said: "It will come as a real body blow for ambulance staff to receive these redundancy letters just on the eve of Christmas."

Mr Worthington acknowledged the timing of the letters was unfortunate.

He said: "The Yorkshire Ambulance Service is becoming a more clinically-focused organisation, with the emphasis on patients and their needs and on identifying how those needs are changing.

"In line with these changes, this letter gives staff formal notice of redundancy if they don't secure employment with YAS, or elsewhere, by 31 March 2007.

"This is in line with national NHS Human Resource Framework to give 90 days' notice of redundancy. This makes the timing of this message to staff very difficult as it is so close to Christmas.

"We have been filling vacancies with fixed-term contracts and temporary staff, so we are hopeful that compulsory redundancies will be kept to a minimum. The trust is committed to providing support to employees at risk of redundancy to secure employment before March 31."

A spokeswoman for the service added the letters were precautionary and a legal requirement.

She said: "We fully anticipate that the majority of people will be redeployed to jobs within Yorkshire Ambulance Service."