Lloyds investors to vote on HBOS

LONDON (Reuters) - Lloyds TSB investors are expected to approve its takeover of HBOS and a government bailout plan on Wednesday, but the bank's executives face a grilling from unions about the potential for up to 50,000 job cuts.

Lloyds TSB Group Union (LTU), which represents over 40,000 staff, wants clarity on the scale of job cuts from the creation of the enlarged Lloyds Banking Group. It wants executives to limit compulsory redundancies and end the offshoring of jobs to India to limit the impact.

"We're talking about 1.5 billion pounds of cost savings and I've seen analysts talking about anything from 20,000 to 50,000 jobs losses," Steve Tatlow, LTU assistant general secretary, told Reuters.

"So far the bank hasn't confirmed any figures, it's chosen not to get into any debate about how many job reductions it's going to lead to," he said.

The union will lobby shareholders as they enter the meeting in Glasgow.

Unite, a union representing Lloyds and HBOS staff, plans to demonstrate outside the meeting and ask the board about the proposed cost savings, offshoring, pay and union recognition.

Lloyds and HBOS employ 145,000 staff between them. Lloyds expects the takeover to save 1.5 billion pounds a year by 2011, largely through thousands of job cuts.

Lloyds agreed to buy HBOS in September in a government brokered deal after HBOS's share price was ravaged by concern about its health as the credit crisis deepened.

The banks are due to receive a combined 17 billion pounds under a government recapitalisation plan agreed last month.