DWP announce further office closures in Dover, Warrington and St Helens

DWP announced today that in addition to the office closure in Lincoln they plan to close a further three Service and Support Centres (SSC) in Dover, Warrington and St Helens in September 2026. Jobcentre and Health Assessment Centre functions operating in Gregson House in St Helens will not be affected. Dover and Warrington are SSC sites only and will close in their entirety.

This decision will result in 160 members of staff in Dover facing relocation to either Ramsgate if they are Counter Fraud, Compliance & Debt or Canterbury if they are currently delivering Retirement Services Directorate work. 253 staff will be impacted by the closures of St Helens and Warrington SSCs, all of whom will be forced to relocate to Wigan if they want to keep their jobs in DWP.

For many members the closure of these offices and resulting longer travel time will create serious problems and significant inconvenience. For some the proposed moves resulting from the office closures may well not be possible, raising the serious risk of redundancies.

DWP GEC will fight office closures

DWP office closures can have devastating impacts on the staff that work in them and the communities they are located in. The PCS DWP group executive committee (GEC) has vowed to fight every office closure with every tool at its disposal. PCS fundamentally opposes these office closures, and any further closures of either service centres or Jobcentres where jobs will be removed from communities.

Members currently working in SSCs across the DWP estate will now be fearing the worst as a result of the announced closures of Lincoln, Dover, Warrington and St Helens service centres and the DWP's continued refusal to reconsider its flawed 2016 estates strategy.

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