BT has axed 250 IT contractors as part of a plan to shift jobs in-house.

Hundreds of shocked workers - the majority of whom are from BT's IT division based at Adastral Park near Ipswich - have been given a month's notice to pack their bags.

Insiders told The Register that the job cuts came out of the blue and that the work will be passed onto Indian IT centres instead.

A spokesman for BT admitted that some 250 "roles have been released" but he denied that the jobs would be taken up by workers in India.

In a statement BT said: "As BT transforms into a competitive networked IT services company, it is creating a world class team of thousands of skilled, externally-facing IT professionals by 2007 backed by one of the biggest training programmes that UK business has ever seen.

"On an ongoing basis, BT staff will move into the revenue - generating ICT roles currently fulfilled by contractors.

"With this in mind, BT recently released a couple of hundred IT contractors." ®

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