NEWS CHANNEL
The city has more reason to celebrate this week after Network Rail revealed that its new headquarters will bring 1,000 jobs to Milton Keynes.
The new building, situated on the former National Hockey Stadium site, will house 3,000 employees and a third of them will be recruited from the area.
People who would not think of Network Rail as an employer are being encouraged to look at what vacancies the company has to offer.
A wide range of jobs are available at the offices, which span across various disciplines.
A spokesman for Network Rail said: “There are a lot of roles that people wouldn’t think that Network Rail would offer.
“When people think of Network Rail they think of construction workers in their high visibility jackets but we also need people who help with the general running of rail services on a daily basis.”
Staff will startmoving into the headquarters in June and the building will be fully staffed by the autumn.
The spokesman added: “Obviously this is a boost for Milton Keynes’ economy and we are committed to Milton Keynes, but our aim is to enable as many people as possible to keep their current jobs.
“If for whatever reason this is not possible then we’ll offer the positions to local people.”
Jobs that are now available have been passed up by current employees who do not wish to relocate.
However, Network Rail explained that these vacancies are not connected to the news that current employees could be made redundant if they could not get to the new Milton Keynes offices within 75 minutes.
This stipulation was defended by the company, which said it is not an unprecedented requirement and explained it was put in place to protect the work and home life balance of its employees.
The spokesman said: “This isn’t something that has just been sprung on the employees in the last week, they have known this for some time and we will offer help to anyone who has to relocate.”
Some of the positions have already been filled but there are many more still available at www.networkrail.co.uk/jobs.
