Unison claims that women may suffer proportionally more job losses than men under plans to shake up local government in Dorset.

The union is also worried that there could be job losses at existing councils before the new Dorset Council comes into being in April next year in an attempt to further cut costs.

But a spokesman for the shadow council, Cllr Peter Wharf, says the ongoing exercise to look at jobs is ‘preparatory’ and that checks will be made when the time comes to ensure women are not unfairly disadvantaged. He says there will be no compulsory redundancies before April 2019.

Union officials are critical of the shadow Dorset Council for bringing forward their investigation of job roles without going through the recognised negotiating channels – claiming that the first it knew of the exercise was when the shadow executive met in October.

A formal letter to councillors from the union says: “Concerns have already been raised by our members that the new authority will have few women in senior positions, that in the two areas likely to suffer the brunt of the redundancies (Environment and Support Services) it seems likely many more women will face losing their jobs.”

The union also questions what it sees as a move to accelerate the process of preparing to bring the councils together, including a risk of job losses prior to the change-over from six councils to one in April 2019. The shadow council says it is only planning ahead with no firm proposals at the moment.

Unison is now asking to see the details of the proposals and the current predicted number of job losses – pointing out that the business plan for the unitary council is now more than 18 months old and is likely to have changed since it was first published.

There is also criticism for the Government – for agreeing the merger of local councils without providing any financial help, which will mean costs of between £25 and £35million having to be made from ‘savings’ – something which the union believes could mean additional cuts to public services.

“Existing staff hold significant concerns over the potential impact of the proposed changes, particularly in respect of job losses. It is also important to ensure that staff feel engaged with the process rather feeling it is being imposed upon them,” said the Unison letter, signed by joint Dorset branch secretaries Amanda Brown and Aileen Powell.

Cllr Peter Wharf, lead member for HR & Workforce, said: “The budget paper seen by the Shadow Executive Committee on 15 October outlined the plans to combine some services currently delivered across existing councils.

“The design work and planning is now taking place so that we can better understand current structures and reporting lines. The work on this is only just starting and so there is no indication yet of any specific implications. We will carry out equality checks on any process that we put in place.”

Cllr Wharf says the shadow authority team preparing for the new Dorset Council next April will continue to meet with the unions and staff.

“Employees will be consulted on any proposed changes from January. There will be no compulsory redundancies before April. The original business case, which is now 18 months old, gave indications that around 440 jobs would be lost across the two new authorities, Dorset Council and Bournemouth, Christchurch and Poole Council. These numbers will be revised as we begin to work on more detailed plans.”

He added: “We are holding regular employee briefings and sharing as much information as possible with employees and the unions. There are savings to be made, but this is also about being a more efficient council and protecting our front-line services.”