DOZENS of foreign teachers could soon be arriving in Hampshire to take up posts in local schools as the staffing crisis deepens.

Today, both the county council and Southampton City Council confirmed they had launched special recruitment campaigns abroad in a bid to ensure classes remain covered over the coming year.

Advertisements have been placed in newspapers and education magazines in a number of countries, including Bulgaria, Germany, France and the Republic of Ireland.

Yesterday the Daily Echo revealed that Testwood School in Totton had hired teachers from Bulgaria because of the shortage in Britain.

There are currently 100 unfilled teacher posts in schools run by the county council, while Southampton education chiefs are looking to fill 20 full-time and three part-time posts.

It is the first time the two authorities have had to go overseas to search for teachers - but it could now become a standard procedure for the future.

Chairman of the county council's education committee, Don Allen, said the dire measures now being taken to recruit teachers reflects the seriousness of the national problem.

"I think initially parents will obviously be slightly concerned about teachers coming to our schools from abroad," he added. "But they must ask themselves whether they want their child to have a teacher in front of them in class or not.

"There is every evidence that the teachers who are being recruited from abroad, particularly Bulgaria, are highly skilled and speak extremely good English. I can see no real problem with it.

"There is a severe shortage of teachers across the country and it is going to get worse," he warned.

"Teachers are leaving the profession because they are fed-up with the sheer level of bureaucracy that has been loaded on top of them from the government over the past four years."