FORTY workers at a hotel and training centre have started the New Year out of a job.

The multi-million pound flagship TAD (Training, Advice and Development) Centre on Teesside went into voluntary liquidation yesterday.

The board of directors will release a statement today. The workforce was told yesterday their contracts of employment had been terminated.

Paul Morrison, who has lost his job as the centre's managing director, said: " I do not think anyone's circumstances are more tragic than others, but there are married couples who used to work there, so for a family that is two incomes gone, not just one.''

News that the site was threatened with closure was broken by The Northern Echo before Christmas.

The complex, a Middlesbrough City Challenge project, was launched with more than £4m of Government cash and European grants, in 1994.

Stakeholder Middlesbrough Council leased the building to TAD, which was limited by guarantee.

The council could not be contacted for comment yesterday, but days ago revealed it could not afford to continue to bankroll the centre.

The council said then that the centre had faced a series of financial difficulties during recent years and that the council had provided discretionary rate relief of approximately £60,000 and bank guarantee support of £93,000.

A statement said requests for increasing levels of support had recently been received, including one for a further £65,000.

Council finance officers had analysed the financial position of the company and concluded that any further support could not guarantee their ongoing operation.

Mr Morrison said: " I completely understand the position of the council in that they have a wider responsibility to the taxpayer and they cannot have an open-ended commitment. That was not what we were asking for.''

He said the company had warned Middlesbrough Council it could not survive in its present format and met the local authority's corporate management team on November 7. It had hoped to discuss a range of options for the centre's future.