THE owner of mobile phone operator Orange last night made assurances it would not be reducing jobs in the UK.

State-owned France Telecom yesterday said it would cut 8.5 per cent of its 200,000 staff worldwide - or 17,000 jobs - by the end of 2008.

However, it said 16,000 of the losses would be in France and it would not be making any in the UK, where the company employs 12,000 people at Orange and 3,500 at broadband provider Wanadoo.

Orange has call centres with more than 5,000 workers in Darlington, Peterlee, County Durham, and North Tyneside.

A France Telecom spokeswoman said: "There will be 1,000 job cuts outside France, but the number of employees in the UK is going to remain stable."

France Telecom has shed a similar number of jobs in the past three years to cut costs.

The news came as the company said revenues for Orange in the UK were up 0.8 per cent to 5.8 billion euros (£4bn) after its customer base grew 4.5 per cent to 14.9 million last year.

France Telecom took full control of Orange in April 2004 after splashing out £31bn for a majority stake in 2000.

The company said group revenues were up to 49.04 billion euros (£33.62bn) last year with the help of a sharp increase in broadband take-up through its businesses, such as Wanadoo.

Earnings grew 2.8 per cent to 18.42 billion euros (£12.63bn), which sent net income up 98 per cent to 6.36 billion euros (£4.36bn).

France Telecom is the second largest mobile phone operator in Europe behind Deutsche Telekom.