Business rates agency set to lose 75% of senior staff

maintained with appeals being resolved efficiently whilst haemorrhaging experience and expertise.’

The agency, which collects £25billion a year, is battling glitches in a new IT system.

The VOA did not comment on senior staff cuts but insisted the 1,000 job losses would ‘deliver the best service in the most cost effective way’. in the VOA and the civil service as a whole.’

Sources said many senior staff are speaking to other organisations about new jobs ahead of the announcement.

Mark Rigby, chief executive of business rent and rates specialist CVS, said: ‘It’s foolhardy of the Government to think providing fair and accurate property valuations can be of business rates south of the Border prompted fury from those facing sharply higher bills.

Mark Serwotka, general secretary at the Public and Commercial Services Union, said: ‘These savage cuts to the staffing levels in the VOA will have a devastating effect on service. The Government needs to seriously rethink its strategy of budget cuts THE Government is poised to announce a swathe of job cuts at the department responsible for overseeing business rates, despite rising pressure on the organisation to help firms struggling with their bills.

Three-quarters of the Valuation Office Agency’s 80 senior officers are expected to be axed as part of plans to downsize it.

A cut in the number of regional offices from 51 to 30 over the next three years is part of a long-term goal of slashing jobs by 1,000 – almost a third of staff – by 2021. Sources close to the department expect details of the cuts to be announced next month.

The move comes just months after a revaluation