News | Page 12

Hundreds of new jobs are due to be created when Southampton port chiefs confirm a fifth cruise terminal scheme in the city, which would boost the local economy by £150m a year. Associated British Ports joint chief Doug Morrison said: “This will be good for the people who live in Southampton and the people who come in because of the ships.

Talks to ward off a strike by hospital cleaners at Southampton General Hospital had to be cancelled because of heavy snow. Management and union officials were due to meet ACAS, in an eleventh hour bid to avoid industrial action. However, due to the wintry weather ACAS officials were stuck in nearby Fleet and unable to reach the city.

Hampshire County Council is one of many local authorities stating its worries over what factors would determine the level of funding as a result of this autumn’s Spending Review. The coalition has already announced that councils face an annual seven per cent reduction in their budgets.

Basingstoke-based printing concern De La Rue, which prints notes for the Bank of England and more than 150 national currencies, said production problems have cost the group £35 million. Profits at the mill at Overton, near Basingstoke, were affected by staff allegedly fudging quality-control paperwork.

Member of Parliament for Arundel and South Downs, Nick Herbert has registered his concerns about the proposal to close Findon and Keymer Fire Stations (two stations in his constituency) which forms part of the West Sussex Fire and Rescue Service (WSFRS) Draft Action Plan for 2011-12. The WSFRS published the Plan with a view to reorganising fire services in the county and save £1.2 million.

Portsmouth Council leader Gerald Vernon-Jackson has said the authority will work with unions in a clash over the scale of council job losses in Portsmouth. The controversy erupted after the government said local authority funding will be cut by 28.4% by 2015. All parties agreed the cuts would mean job losses at the city council. The union Unison said 400 jobs will go but Mr Vernon-Jackson said the figure was likely to be 200.

Portsmouth-based aircraft carrier HMS Ark Royal is to be scrapped early as part of the government’s defence review. The measure means pilots are facing unemployment as Britain will not have the ability to launch fighter jets at sea until 2019 at least. HMS Ark Royal is the fifth vessel to bear the distinguished name. It entered service in 1985 and played a key role in the Balkans conflict in the early 1990s, and in the invasion of Iraq in 2003.

Gangs hanging around next to homes on a busy main road in Fareham in Hampshire have broken windows, damaged a roof, destroyed fencing and stolen gates. The problem is the gangs congregate on a footbridge over the carriageway adjacent to the houses. One resident, Kim Langley, says she was forced to brick up one of her own windows.

Getting to work in the capital first thing next week will be a battle for those living in the southern region since workers are walking out overnight.

More than 100 firefighters tackled a massive Basingstoke construction site fire at Gershwin Road. Eyewitness Debbie Bennett said she came out of supermarket in the area and saw people looking into the sky. "I saw that smoke had blotted out the sun. There were flames high above the trees,” she said.

Hampshire police plans to cut 1,400 jobs as the public spending restrictions begin to bite. Forces are facing government cuts of 25 per cent, with Hampshire reducing its budget by £70m (25%) over the next four years. The job losses will see redundancies, positions left unfilled, redeployments and voluntary redundancies. The force also plans to share and sell buildings and increase collaboration with other forces, especially Thames Valley.

A money-saving plan has been given final approval for the Hampshire force to operate two helicopters with Sussex and Surrey Police instead of each flying their own. Flying two aircraft, one based at RAF Odiham in Hampshire, will save millions of pounds.