A WORKER who lost both legs in an accident at Southampton Docks has been given hope that he could walk again.

Speaking for the first time since being awarded £725,000 damages in an out-of-court settlement, Reginald Whitmarsh told the Daily Echo that specialists were confident of creating artificial limbs that would let him walk and sit comfortably for the first time in six years.

The 50-year-old had his legs amputated after a 16.5-tonne ship section hit him while he was refitting the Stena Londoner ferry in 1995.

He sued his employer A&P Southampton Ltd, which admitted liability but disputed the amount of compensation.

The father-of-two, of Burgess Road, Bassett, Southampton, has criticised the judge at the High Court in London for "forcing" a settlement from the parties.

But he said some of the money would pay for high-quality artificial limbs from Dorset Orthopaedic Clinic, near Ringwood, where Sir Paul McCartney's girlfriend Heather Mills and New Forest youngster Laura Giddings, who lost a foot in a bomb blast in South Africa in 1998, receive treatment.

"I am now just a torso because I lost both legs," said Mr Whitmarsh.

"I have been to the clinic twice, although from what I have been told I do not expect to get an enormous amount of use from artificial legs.

"But it will be nice to stand up, walk around the garden and sit comfortably again and they will look normal from a cosmetic point of view.

"I had artificial limbs from the NHS and I could walk on them OK but they hurt when I sat back down in my wheelchair and so I stopped using them."

He said the cost would be about #15,000 but that the compensation deal was less than he had hoped.

"It seems to me that we were steamrollered into a settlement by the judge and the whole case was judged before we got there - it was appalling."

Mr Whitmarsh, who is married to Hazel, said the money would help ease his suffering and make his life more normal, including adaptations to his home and car as well as new limbs.

"I was not looking for a massive settlement but everything will cost so much that I will have to think twice before buying it," he added.