PARKING wardens in Southampton are to strike for seven days next week over pay cuts.

Unions this week launched indefinite industrial action in a bitter dispute over cuts to the pay and conditions of staff at the city council.

Nearly 100 bin men have walked out for five days this week in the first of a rolling programme of targeted strikes designed to cripple key council services.

Unions leaders said today they will be followed next Tuesday by 40 civil enforcement officers, car parking maintenance engineers and bulk cash collectors.

They said there will be no parking enforcement or repair of failing ticket machines.

Some 2,400 Unite and Unison members started taking part in industrial action short of a strike on Monday.

Around 4,300 council workers have been threatened with dismissal if they don’t sign up to new contracts cutting their pay by up to 5.5 per cent.

Tory council leaders, who are axing around 250 staff including senior managers, say the pay cuts are needed to make budget savings and save 400 more job losses over the next two years.

The council said it was looking at the implications of the announcement and what it will need do to operate a parking service in the city next week.