Staff at the Bank of England are on alert for potential job cuts in Threadneedle Street after the governor, Andrew Bailey, warned of tough decisions about the institution’s future cost base.
Sky News has learnt that Mr Bailey informed Bank of England employees in a memo last week that it was taking a detailed look at costs, although it did not specifically refer to the prospect of redundancies.
One source said the memo had been sent while Mr Bailey was attending the International Monetary Fund (IMF) meeting in Washington.
Its precise wording was unclear on Monday, but one source said it had warned of “tough choices” that would need to be made as the bank accelerated its investment in new technology.
They added that managers had been briefed to expect to have to make savings of between 6% and 8% of their operating budgets.
The Bank of England employed 5,810 people at the end of February, of whom just over 5,000 were full-time, according to its annual report.
Those numbers were marginally higher than in the previous year.
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The central bank’s budget, funded through a levy, is expected to be £596m in the current financial year.
The workforce figures include the Prudential Regulation Authority, Britain’s main banking regulator, which is set to get a new boss next year when Sam Woods steps down after two terms in the role.
A Bank of England spokesperson declined to comment on the contents of Mr Bailey’s memo.
They also declined to provide details of the timing of any previous rounds of redundancies at the bank.
