City & Guilds faces legal and industrial action over plans to cut hundreds of jobs

Key points

• City & Guilds is facing potential legal and industrial action over claims it has been “dishonest” over plans to shed about 400 UK staff.
• Officials at the Unite union allege the owner of the training and qualifications body has been “unlawfully withholding key information during transfer consultations”, while also “ for new recruits when it is legally required to give staff at risk of redundancy first refusal”.
• The row represents yet another crisis at the embattled former vocational charity, whose business was acquired by the private company PeopleCert last autumn in a controversial deal that went on to trigger a statutory inquiry by the Charity Commission in January, as well as PeopleCert commissioning its own internal investigation.
• The investigations are understood to be considering Guardian revelations concerning a pair of City & Guilds executives receiving million-pound bonuses and sizeable salary increases after the sale.
• Unite regional officer Peter Storey said:...