TWELVE thousand county council staff are to be offered voluntary redundancy as the council bids to plug a £90m budget gap.

The entire workforce is to be offered an enhanced package which is based on factors such as age and time served as the county bids to cut hundreds of jobs by 2015.

Letters will be sent to staff in the coming weeks. The scheme will close at the end of March next year.

It comes as plans to cut a further £100million from the county council budget by 2018 were put into motion today.

About 1,000 jobs are set to go as part of these budget cuts which are predicted to be so hard hitting that county council bosses have given the go ahead to start planning two years before they come into force.

The future of many frontline services, include those safeguarding some of society's most vulnerable children and adults, will also be under threat in the “colossal” round of cuts.

Money to repair Hampshire's roads, waste disposal and even the county's trading standards service could also be severely streamlined as those holding the purse strings at Hampshire County Council attempt to balance the books.

But addressing a cabinet meeting today, county leader Cllr Roy Perry said Hampshire had to face up to the fact that Government grants to councils would continue to fall and action was needed to balance the books.

He said: “It's no good putting decisions off. The sooner one addresses the situation, the easier it is to handle and deal with it.

“That has been our strategy up to now and that will continue to be our strategy.”

Further details of the cuts will be agreed in July.

It comes as the county council's own chief executive Andrew Smith predicts the dire financial situation will not improve for “many, many years to come” and says there is no longer any “easy” way to make savings.