Greymouth staff had wanted to know the outcome of Inland Revenue (IRD) restructuring as soon as possible so they were told before Christmas, Revenue Minister Peter Dunne said today.Eight jobs will go at Greymouth, part of 27 IRD job cuts in regional offic
Greymouth staff had wanted to know the outcome of Inland Revenue (IRD) restructuring as soon as possible so they were told before Christmas, Revenue Minister Peter Dunne said today.
Eight jobs will go at Greymouth, part of 27 IRD job cuts in regional offices.
Offices and counters were not closing but some positions in Timaru (13), Greymouth (eight) and Gisborne (six), were being cut, IRD acting deputy commissioner service delivery Heather Daly said yesterday.
Some jobs would go at processing sites at Christchurch and Te Rapa, in Hamilton.
The Public Service Association (PSA) said the cuts were large, given there were only 22 jobs in the East Coast operation, 17 in the West Coast and 27 in Timaru.
Services in Dunedin, Whangarei, Tauranga, Rotorua, Palmerston North, Napier, Invercargill and New Plymouth may also be scaled back, PSA national secretary Richard Wagstaff said.
"The cuts for these three small sites represent a staff reduction of around 50 percent. If this trend continues for phase two and three of IRD's restructuring more than 500 jobs could go."
The West Coast is struggling this week with the news that Pike River coal mine has gone into receivership after an explosions that killed 29 workers.
"When it rains, it rains down here, and now its pouring," Greymouth mayor Tony Kokshoorn told Radio New Zealand this morning.
"From our point of view the timing couldn't be worse, so it's one of those things but we're not happy about it. It's another eight jobs we've got to find on top of all the Pike River redundancies."
Mr Dunne said he had talked to IRD bosses when the mine disaster happened and they sent a senior official to Greymouth to talk to staff.
"The overwhelming message we got was 'we want to know the outcome as soon as possible'. So it's really on the basis of their saying 'we want some certainty, we want to know where we stand' that we proceeded at this point."
The job losses were not instant and it would take a few months to look at what would happen -- for example redeployment in other areas or further training.
Mr Wagstaff said the jobs were needed in the centres.
The Justice Ministry was also looking at removing jobs from smaller towns, he said.
"The irony is that these jobs are what IRD calls 'virtual jobs' -- jobs the department admits can be done anywhere but wants to move them out of the regions and into the main centres for economies of scale."
Financial arguments were also questionable, he said, given the cost of redundancies.
Labour MP Grant Robertson said the Government had promised frontline services but was instead cutting services in the regions in favour of centralisation.
Mr Dunne said offices had a mix of services unrelated to the location they were based.
"The way in which people do jobs, the way they do them today, will change over the years ahead."
