Staff at Story Contracting are facing an uncertain Christmas with a round of redundancies understood to be underway at the rail division.

The Enquirer understands that jobs are under threat in England following slower than expected workloads coming through from Network Rail under the current five-year Control Period 7 (CP7) investment programme which started in April.

One source said: “We won a series of places on CP7 and geared the business-up up for higher volumes of work but that just isn’t coming through at the moment.

“This has led to a round of redundancies and a lot of people here are very nervous going into Christmas.

“No-one is sure exactly what is going on and how many people will be affected.”

Latest results for the year to March 31 2023 for the Carlisle based contractor show a turnover of £206m generating a pre-tax profit of £3m while employing 657 staff.

Story Contracting declined to comment.