THE BBC has pledged there will be no redundancies at its Wood Norton engineering and technical training unit near Evesham under an outsourcing contract with The Capita Group.

Around a quarter of the centre's 70 BBC staff will be affected by the ten-year contract with Capita, which has a base in Birmingham.

"Staff are not being made redundant. Their jobs will remain the same and they will keep all their terms and conditions," a BBC spokeswoman said.

The move was authorised last month by BBC director general Mark Thompson. Around 260 BBC jobs will be transferring to Capita under the contract, which is expected to save more than £50m as a result.

The service centre for the new arrangement will be based in Belfast although there is no indication that Wood Norton staff will be moved there.

Wood Norton currently offers three fully-equipped television studios, four network radio studios, post-production facilities and a sound effects library, which are available to hire by outside companies.