By Padriac Halpin
DUBLIN (Reuters) - Lloyds Banking Group PLC
Following the outcome of a major review of its Irish operations, Britain's largest retail bank said it would focus instead on its business presence in Ireland.
"There is no strategy for this business that will see it achieve break-even or profit in a realistic timeframe. Unfortunately, Halifax is simply too small to succeed in this contracting market," Lloyds said in a statement on Tuesday.
Lloyds said it would also close a customer call centre and its Irish intermediary business -- which provides car finance, commercial asset finance and mortgages through brokers -- as a result of the review.
Northern Irish operations are unaffected.
The Bank of Scotland (Ireland) unit was part of British lender HBOS, taken over by rival Lloyds after it ran into trouble at the height of the financial crisis.
HBOS had aggressive expansion plans for the unit during the Irish boom, rolling out retail branches in a challenge to the country's big banks, but it was then hit hard by the property crash.
Lloyds plans to close the 44 Halifax branches from late May through to June, with the call centre open for slightly longer.
"There is a huge human cost to the announcement today, and people are in a state of total shock," Bernard Daly, a representative of union Unite at the bank, said, accusing Lloyds of "panicking."
"It is a crazy, wrongheaded decision which is likely born of a London boardroom that has no sense of the strong future which the bank can have. We will not give up on these jobs, they are too important for the country."
Lloyds, 43 percent owned by the government since its rescue by taxpayers, is in the throes of a reorganisation, streamlining its business after the HBOS merger and also selling off a string of British assets under a state aid ruling from EU regulators late last year.
It said on Tuesday it was committed to a "strong presence" in Irish corporate and commercial banking markets, but plans to reshape the business.
Lloyds declined to comment on the cost of the overhaul. The bank said in November it was on track to hit its cost saving targets set after the HBOS merger.
(Additional reporting by Clara Ferreira-Marques in London and Barbara Lewis in Dublin; Editing by David Holmes and Sharon Lindores)
(c) Reuters 2012. All rights reserved. Republication or redistribution of Reuters content, including by caching, framing or similar means, is expressly prohibited without the prior written consent of Reuters. Reuters and the Reuters sphere logo are registered trademarks and trademarks of the Reuters group of companies around the world.
