Plans for a £41 million city centre office complex for hundreds of Home Office workers have been dropped. Stoke-on-Trent City Council had been planning to build the bespoke facility on the Smithfield development as a permanent base for Home Office staff in the city.

But the Home Office has now announced that it will be looking to sign a long-term lease for existing office space in Stoke-on-Trent instead. The news comes as the number of Home Office jobs in the city has risen to more than 500, two years after the government chose Stoke-on-Trent as a new regional base.

Civil servants in areas such as customer service and asylum are currently based in the Two Smithfield building in Hanley, after the Home Office signed a lease for 38,000 sq ft of office space in 2023. The previous Conservative government decided to create the jobs in Stoke-on-Trent as part of a major drive to move civil servants out of London.

Last December, in a behind-closed-doors meeting, cabinet members at the city council backed plans to borrow £40.8 million to pay for the new permanent Home Office base, with talks ongoing between the authority, the government and Smithfield developer Genr8. While this project has now been scrapped, the new Labour government has reiterated the commitment to Stoke-on-Trent.

This comes as the number of Home Office jobs in the city has risen to more than 500 (LDRS).

Minister of State, Lord David Hanson said: "We are committed to having a strong presence in Stoke-on-Trent and by fulfilling our commitment to bring more than 500 jobs to the city, we will ensure the region has a huge part to play in tackling some of the biggest challenges facing the UK.

"Since taking office I have held constructive discussions with local partners in the region and I look forward to building on these relationships to explore how the Home Office can provide further opportunities to Stoke-on-Trent."

City council leader Jane Ashworth welcomed the number of Home Office jobs in Stoke-on-Trent reaching 500, and said the authority would continue to support the government in its search for a permanent base in the city. She said: "We are so pleased to see that the Home Office has hit its target of bringing 500 new jobs to the city in such a short space of time. This is a huge milestone for Stoke-on-Trent.

"We want to ensure our residents have access to good jobs with higher wages, so we are delighted that the Home Office has made this commitment to our city.

"We will continue to work with the Home Office to ensure they can find a permanent home in the city. We will look at how we can potentially use existing or repurposed sites and do everything we can to ensure these new jobs remain in the city for the long-term."

The jobs milestone has also been welcomed by Stoke-on-Trent's three Labour MPs.

In a joint statement, Gareth Snell, Allison Gardner and David Williams said: "We welcome today's announcement that the target of 500 Home Office jobs in Stoke-on-Trent has been met. It is a demonstration that this government is serious about its pledge to rebalance the economy and ensure every part of the country feels the benefit of growth and investment.

"The new Government has rightly honoured the previous commitments made to the city but we know that securing the future of the Home Office jobs here is just the start of the support we can expect. Since the election, we have spoken with ministers across various Government departments and made the case for more direct investment into the City and championed Stoke-on-Trent as a great place to do business."

According to official government figures, there were 1,710 civil service workers in Stoke-on-Trent on March 31 this year, compared to 1,245 in 2021.

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