Dutch unions favour Barclays, ABN AMRO merger

AMSTERDAM (Reuters) - Dutch unions would rather see Barclays succeed in its bid to buy Dutch bank ABN AMRO as few job cuts are expected compared to a rival bidder's deal, Dutch union groups said on Monday.

Barclays agreed to buy ABN AMRO for about 67 billion euros (46 billion pounds) in shares which would result in 3.5 billion euros of annual savings, including 23,600 job reductions or just over 10 percent of the combined workforce. Just under half of the positions being cut will move offshore.

In many Dutch merger deals employees are considered stakeholders with a say in whether a deal goes through smoothly or not. ABN AMRO has about 24,000 jobs in the Netherlands.

A consortium of Royal Bank of Scotland Plc, Belgian-Dutch group Fortis and Spain's Santander have asked ABN to consider takeover talks, which would entail a break-up of ABN's extensive, global retail and wholesale banking operations.

Three unions representing about 8,000 ABN employees said they would raise opposition to a possible takeover by the RBS-led consortium as it would entail more job cuts in the Netherlands due to overlap with Fortis.

"Looking at the alternatives of Barclays or the consortium Fortis, Royal Bank of Scotland, and Santander, we would choose Barclays in particular because there are more job guarantees," said Huug Gorter, negotiator for Dutch union FNV Bondgenoten, which represents about 3,000 ABN workers.

De Unie, which said it represents about 2,500 of ABN's 24,000 employees in the Netherlands, was "moderately positive" about Barclay's takeover proposal and felt reassured after meeting ABN's board of directors on Monday morning.

Of the 12,800 job losses at ABN the majority will be in Britain, Spain and Italy, De Unie said.

"We expect some hundreds lost in the Netherlands," De Unie negotiator Joop Hofland said.

Dutch union CNV representing less than 2,500 ABN employees said a takeover by Barclays would "hurt the least" and it expected no forced lay-offs, CNV negotiator Ahmed Kansouh said.