UNION officials and health bosses will meet today for crucial talks which could lead to staff at the Royal Bolton Hospital taking industrial action.

The meeting with Bolton NHS Foundation Trust chiefs comes a week after the trust announced it would be cutting 500 jobs. They include 149 nurses, midwives and healthcare assistants, 20 medical and dental staff, 93 technicians, scientists and clinical support, 193 non-clinical staff and 45 estate facilities employees, from the hospital and other services managed by the trust.

A 90-day consultation was launched and health chiefs confirmed they could not rule out compulsory redundancies.

Trust bosses say the decision to cut jobs comes after attempts to reduce the wages bill by not filling vacant positions, by putting jobs in a lower pay band, reducing bank and agency spending and redeploying staff.

In addition to the 500 under threat jobs, a further 1,685 employees, including 1,450 nurses, midwives and healthcare assistants, could lose their jobs and be forced to reapply for their positions on “revised terms and conditions”, which could mean changes in hours, pay and responsibility.

The trust employs about 5,300 staff.

Staff Side, which represents employees, has not ruled out strikes, but said it is too early to talk about industrial action.

Representatives from the hospital’s Staff Side will meet with hospital management, including the interim chairman David Wakefield, today to discuss the cuts. Mr Wakefield has said the trust will do everything it can to avoid compulsory redundancies.

He added: “People can be assured the quality of patient care will not deteriorate as a result of these savings and every savings scheme will be signed off by the medical director and chief nurse so that it is safe.”

Harry Hanley, secretary of Staff Side, said: “We want to know if anything is going to be detrimental to our services that we provide.

“Any discussions of industrial action will be after that.”

A member of staff at the hospital, who asked to remain anonymous, said everyone was “upset and angry and wants to go on strike”.

John Murphy, joint Staff Side chairman, said: “Staff Side are not at this time considering strike action.

“We wish to negotiate with management in good faith and we can’t do that if we go to the table threatening strike action. We will be putting forward our concerns about the process.”

Heather Edwards, the Trust’s head of communications, said: “Further to the announcement last week that up to 500 posts may potentially be made redundant, the Trust has called a meeting with both our local and regional trade union colleagues in order to ensure we consult on the proposals meaningfully and discuss ways we can reduce this number of potential redundancies.

“The Trust is hopeful that the meeting will be constructive and together we can identify ways to avoid job losses at these levels.”