The issue of outsourcing jobs from the UK and Ireland to up-and-coming economic powerhouses like India continues to remain a thorny problem for the UK's trade unions, who see high-paid (by global standards) UK workers being axed in favour of lower paid staff overseas.

In the past month the issue has become more worrying for the information industry, as subsidiaries of the bigger companies grapple with balancing their primary goal of generating greater profits for shareholders with the need to keep the customers satisfied.

This month Thomson Scientific & Health (TSH) embarked on a 30-day consultation with staff in Glasgow, Limerick, Manchester and London with the view to moving operations to India and savagely cutting back operations here. Reports suggest 200 research jobs are for the axe in Limerick, 50 in Glasgow and a further 140 in England.

But what may be worrying bosses at TSH is the spin that trade union Amicus is putting on the proposals. A report in Glasgow-based paper, The Herald, quotes Amicus assistant general secretary Tony Burke as saying: "Thomson is prepared to take risks with quality standards in their desperation to slash labour costs in order to retain a market presence."

It'd be interesting to hear from Thomson what it is doing to ensure quality standards are not compromised by these proposals. Burke sees the impact as far wider than just UK jobs, having a potential detrimental impact on the whole pharmaceutical and biotech sectors, who are heavy users of Thomson information.

Over at Thomson rival Reed Elsevier, its LexisNexis subsidiary has also bitten into the outsourcing apple. But it may have taken the sting out of this by choosing HCL BPO, an Indian-owned outsourcing company that is taking advantage of the currently friendly business climate in Northern Ireland by opening a Belfast-based office. The LexisNexis deal has been able to generate much warmer headlines for LexisNexis, as 100 jobs are being created in Belfast.

How long HCL plans to keep them there is another matter. But at least no one's raising the issue of quality-degradation, for which LexisNexis spinmeisters will be no doubt extremely grateful.