THE number of staff at a Colchester adult learning centre are set to be cut by about half, the Gazette understands.

Essex County Council, which runs the Wilson Marriage Centre, in Barrack Street, wants its countywide adult service to start paying for itself.

Bosses are also exploring more commercial opportunities.

Across the whole Essex service, the equivalent of 54 full time employees are set to lose their jobs, but the actual number is expected to be higher because some staff work part-time.

An Essex County Council spokesman said final figures are not available for individual centres as all “staff reductions”

are now complete.

He added: ”We are creating a more efficient, customerfocused service and are determined to make improvements that will deliver high quality local adult learning.

“With this in mind, we are planning to increase the number of courses delivered, according to demand.

“To help achieve this we will be reducing back office and management functions in order to focus resources on the direct delivery of adult learning.

“Where reductions are necessary, we are primarily looking to achieve this through voluntary redundancy and redeployment opportunities within the council.”

In a report published last month, the council outlined plans to spend £500,000 to transform the service and £650,000 on redundancies.