Union bosses today said they feared hundreds of Bradford banking jobs could be lost to India or China through cost-cutting.

Officials from two unions representing staff at Abbey National's Bradford offices said there were "very real fears" that call centres could be moved overseas in a bid to reduce the struggling bank's wage bill.

Today the bank - which employs more than 2,000 staff in Bradford - admitted it was considering the move but said "no final decision" had been made.

But Linda Rolph, general secretary of the Abbey National Group Union, condemned bosses for even considering the plan.

The warning came as market intelligence company Key Note said it believed more than 97,000 jobs in UK call centres could disappear by 2008.

It is feared IT jobs at the Abbey could be the first to move, followed by call centre and processing posts.

"We are very concerned about it because we don't believe there is a need to move jobs outside the UK," said Mrs Rolph.

"We have already seen the manufacturing industry move jobs overseas, we do not want to see jobs in the financial sector going there too.

"Bradford has got a lot of call centre and processing jobs and I am sure individuals feel concerned but until we know more there's not a lot we can do about it."

Simon Taylor, of Key Note, said there had been a clear move towards outsourcing over the past two years. Insurance giant Aviva, owners of Norwich Union, came under fire earlier this year after it shifted 400 jobs from the UK to a new call centre in Bangalore, India.

"Countries such as India have now become a world hub for call centres," said Mr Taylor. "Wages are a quarter of those in the UK."

The row has come as Abbey National was accused of moving senior management posts away from Bradford.

The bank last week announced it was to create more than 100 jobs in the city with the relocation of its 'rich persons' private bank arm Cater Allen from Essex.

But the banking union, Unifi, claimed today as many jobs have gone the other way as Abbey National restructures its business operations.

Unifi national secretary Frank Needham, pictured, said he was particularly concerned about the quality of jobs being lost in Bradford. "This certainly could have a big impact locally," he said. "It is beginning to happen in other banks but some can argue that they already operate in these countries, whereas Abbey does not."

Mr Needham said more than 70 Bradford jobs had already been lost in the finance and solutions delivery departments, with the posts being relocated to Milton Keynes.

And he said a number of other jobs went the same way earlier this year and at the end of last year in the insurance and marketing departments.

He said: "We welcome the fact that work is coming to Bradford. But, in total, roughly as many jobs will have gone as they are now bringing in. But they are happening in dribs and drabs, so you don't see the whole picture.

"What concerns us most is that the quality of jobs has changed and a lot of quality jobs have gone from Bradford.

"The jobs that have gone have involved many members of staff in middle management positions who previously worked for National & Provincial and had 20 or 30 years service."

Mr Nedham said he did not question the bank's long-term commitment to Bradford but said staff were paying the price for the company's poor performance in previous years. Earlier this year Abbey reported pre-tax losses of £984m for the year to December 31.

A spokesman for Abbey National confirmed that 82 jobs had gone from Bradford to Milton Keynes since last September. She said the jobs were in departments like marketing, insurance processing and finance.

She added: "It is for exactly the same reasons that the jobs are coming to Bradford - where there is a small centre doing similar work to that at a larger site, we are moving the workforce to the larger sites from the smaller sites to reduce duplication and increase efficiency."

She said the redundancies did not necessarily mean staff would lose their jobs because they were offered redeployment.

The spokesman admitted that Abbey had looked at the possibility of outsourcing services to India but said: "absolutely no decisions have been made".

Supermarket group Tesco today also revealed plans to switch 350 IT posts to a new support centre in India.