The government's plans to close 550 benefit offices and a third of all pension centres will cost 11,000 jobs.

Unions claimed that the move by the Department for Work and Pensions will mean that thousands of pensioners will be denied access to local services as all but 100 of the existing 650 benefit processing offices were closed.

A further 5,500 staff are likely to be made redundant or redeployed from 10 of the twenty-nine pension centres across the country.

Both proposals are the first phase of cutting 30,000 civil servants from the DWP by 2008 which was announced by the chancellor in his Budget.