IPSWICH MP Chris Mole has told of his “disappointment” after it was revealed that 120 jobs in the town are going at insurance giant AXA.

Anthony Bond

IPSWICH MP Chris Mole has told of his “disappointment” after it was revealed that 120 jobs in the town are going at insurance giant AXA.

Mr Mole said he believed that only 60 people may be directly affected and said it was important that those who lose their jobs are not out of work for too long.

“My first reaction is disappointment that 120 people in Ipswich will be losing the opportunity to work over the coming weeks. But this is slightly offset by the understanding that it may only affect 60 people directly because they are seeking to achieve half the number that they need in redundancy through voluntarily redundancy and natural wastage.

“Also, if you look at where the axe has fallen across AXA, the majority are in other parts of the UK and less have gone from Ipswich which I think is out of confidence in the Ipswich facility in many ways.”

Mr Mole said he had already spoken to James Hehir, the chief executive of Ipswich Borough Council, to urge the council to help those whose jobs are at risk with getting back to work.

And he said he may be visiting the company in the coming weeks to discuss the job losses.

“The critical thing is that if people are going to be out of work then it is for a short a time as possible and they do not lose the skills they have.

“I am sure that they will, like everybody else who has faced redundancy in recent months, be wishing this was not happening to them. I would urge everybody that is concerned about paying their mortgage to look at the help that the government has made available to people in a redundancy situation.”

He added: “In a way I think that the global financial crisis has effected a lot of people in the financial sector in other parts of the country and it almost has not, until now, reached Ipswich so it is good in a way that it has taken so long. But it is not surprising that AXA might look at the business to ensure that they are as streamlined as possible in a difficult time for the financial sector.”