CUTBACKS at Southampton City Council could result in more than 90 more jobs being lost.

Over 200 jobs are likely to be axed in fresh service cuts next year at the council, and now another 94 positions could go in the housing team over the next four years.

It comes as Labour council chiefs prepare to rubber stamp the housing and revenue account (HRA) budget, which funds all work on housing in the city.

And earlier this month residents in Canberra Towers, Weston, complained about damp, mould and broken lifts and opposition figures say they hope changes will not mean vital works are not completed.

The Daily Echo reported last week that 194 jobs are set to be axed in this year’s council budget, with up to 40 management posts also at risk, although a four per cent council tax increase has been scaled back to two per cent.

The council’s housing budget has also been set, with Labour saying it has been hit by an announcement by the government on cuts to social rent which will leave it £33m worse off over the next four years.

Service cuts of £4.3m have been announced for 2016/17, and £17.6m by 2019/20. As part of the proposals 94 jobs – 57 of which are currently vacant – could be scrapped over the next four years, including a number of management positions.

The council says £1.4m a year will come from more work being done in-house as opposed to through sub-contractors, and £700,000 from reducing the number of managers.

Many savings are predicted to come from making the housing service work more efficiently, while some proposals to increase income by £279,000 a year have also been put forward.

They include a £1 increase a week for garage use for private tenants, increasing the charge for the Careline alarm system from £2.50 to £3 a week for the silver monitoring service and £3.50 to £4.50 a week for the gold response service.

As part of the council-wide drive to provide more services online, Peartree and Shirley local housing offices will no longer take payments.

Council housing chief Warwick Payne, pictured left, said discussions with unions had taken place and the amount of compulsory redundancies would be as low as possible, with vacant roles lost or staff taking voluntary redundancy.

Saying “tough decisions” may lie ahead in future years, he said: “We will try to make the efficiencies and reductions as painless as possible.

“We believe that by working more efficiently we can hopefully provide the same quality level of service we have provided in the past but government reductions on how much money is available have set us a mountain to climb.

“We will attempt to climb it but government has made our life very difficult.”

The HRA budget, as well as the main council budget, goes before the city council’s cabinet tonight (Feb 9) and the full council the next day, before coming into effect from April.

Conservative opposition housing spokesman David Fuller said he hoped the changes would not affect the standard of work carried out in council properties.

He said: “The focus of the work has got to be that the changes don’t impact on the standard of service provided to residents.

"One of the big things to come from the budget is that a lot are proposed through efficiencies and ‘better working’ and that is all well and good but they should have proposed them earlier.”