BT is slashing a further 6,000 jobs as part of a total cull of 10,000 by the end of March.

The telecoms giant, which employs about 2,000 people in Kent, revealed that it has already shed 4,000 jobs, and the rest would go by the end of March.

The company has large operations across the county, principally in offices in Sevenoaks and Canterbury, but said it did not yet know if the decision would affect the county.

A spokeswoman said the job losses, which mainly involve agency and contracting staff, would be global and it was not possible to say whether there would be any impact on the Kent workforce.

She said: "The jobs to go will be peppered around the world rather than concentrated in a few areas. Direct staff reductions will be achieved through voluntary schemes and not replacing people who retire or leave the business."

She added that customer service was BT’s number one priority and a lot of the jobs to go would be background roles such as IT support.

In a statement announcing second quarter results, BT said it had achieved three-month savings of £161m.

"As part of our ongoing efficiency programmes, we expect to reduce our total labour resource by some 10,000 by the end of the current financial year, the majority of which will be in the area of indirect labour, including agency, contractors, subcontractors and offshore workers."

The business claimed the job losses were not due to the economic downturn but part of ongoing cost savings.

The decision was announced just 24 hours after the UK jobless figure soared to 1.82 million, the highest figure in 10 years.

In Kent and Medway, unemployment went up by 657 to 19,850, making a two-month total of nearly 1,200.