Hewlett Packard has abandoned its plan to offshore 200 IT jobs under its contract with the Department of Work and Pensions (DWP), following an intervention from employment minister Chris Grayling.

It had been proposed that jobs currently based at HP centres in Newcastle, Lytham and Sheffield would be moved to Bangalore, India. This plan was subject to the approval of the Cabinet Office and the DWP, because it involved moving citizen’s data offshore.

Chris Grayling, the employment minister, said he asked HP to keep the work in the UK. "I am delighted that they have now decided not to offshore this work. We have always been clear that we will not offshore any DWP jobs and we are exploring how future offshoring can be minimised," Graying said in a statement seen by Information Age.

Members of the Public and Commercial Services (PCS) union had voted to obstruct the plan by refusing to co-operate with any "knowledge transfer" to the Bangalore centres, although this had yet to commence.

Mark Serwotka, the general secretary of PCS, said that the news was a great reward for campaigning members who had saved their jobs. "It also means that the very real concerns we raised about data security have been listened to, and we are pleased that ministers have seen sense," Serwotka said.

HP’s version of events was that "having considered a range of options, DWP and HP have agreed not to move this work offshore".