FRONTLINE bank workers across the region faced an uncertain future last night after The Royal Bank of Scotland (RBS) announced it was to cut 3,700 jobs.

The bank, which is 70 per cent taxpayer-owned, said it was too early to say whether the cuts across its UK branch network would affect staff in the North-East and North Yorkshire.

But the Unite union claimed the redundancies, due to take effect from May, would have an impact on “every community across the UK”.

It added that those affected would be among the lowest paid, longest-serving and most loyal employees, who had worked in the local branch network for many years.

RBS, which also owns NatWest, said that the job losses were “deeply regrettable, but necessary”, as it aimed to focus more on customer service.

Chief executive of UK retail Brian Hartzer said: ‘‘We need to do better for all our customers and shareholders by modernising the way we operate as a bank.

‘‘We have 30 per cent more staff carrying out administrative duties per customer than our competitors and they spend less than half their time dealing with customers – we can and must do better.

‘‘We have under-invested in our branches and customer infrastructure at a time when people are changing how they bank and changing what they expect their bank to do for them. We have to change that if we are to rebuild our success by serving our customers better.

‘‘The job losses are deeply regrettable, but are necessary.

We don’t like what that means for our people, but we will do all we can to ensure compulsory redundancies are kept to an absolute minimum.”

Unite national officer Rob MacGregor accused RBS of attempting to force customers to use automated services and the internet for banking, in order to make short-term savings.

He said: ‘‘For RBS to announce the cut of 3,700 frontline bank staff from their high street branches across the UK is absolute madness.

“Essentially, RBS has decided that frontline costs should be cut to fund the crisis caused by the City bankers.

‘‘This move to reduce frontline clerical branch staff by up to a third is short-sighted in the extreme. High street banks are busier then ever as customers increasingly seek a trusted, friendly local service.

“Real questions must be answered by management about how they expect to give customers the high-quality, personalised service they currently enjoy from their local branch after they pull out staff in every community across the UK.’’ RBS, which has a total workforce of 105,000 in this country, has 652 Royal Bank of Scotland branches and owns 1,618 branches under the NatWest brand in the UK.

Yesterday’s announcement came as plans to break up RBS and Lloyds Banking Group, following orders from the European Commission, were set to be revealed today.

The duo have been told to sell off parts of their business to safeguard competition concerns, as the price of state support.

RBS is expected to announce the sell-off of key assets, such as its Direct Line insurance business.