More than 150 Sussex workers have been axed and almost 1,000 others will be forced to work a fourday week.

Vacuum equipment manufacturer Edwards, formerly BOC Edwards, said it plans to make up to 176 people redundant at its base in Shoreham as it shifts work to Korea to cut costs.

Every other employee, about 3,500 across the globe, including hundreds in Sussex will move on to a temporary fourday week with the equivalent cut in salary.

Business chiefs are predicting that other companies will soon be forced to shorten their working week, not seen since the Winter of Discontent in the late 1970s.

Bosses at Edwards said the drastic action was taken to secure the company's future in deteriorating global market conditions.

Meanwhile, 19 people lost their jobs with the collapse of international couriers and removals company Euroxpress, based in the Lineside Industrial Estate in Littlehampton.

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