Thirty jobs are to go as Johnston Press closes its pre-press department at the Derbyshire Times.

Last month the company announced proposals to transfer work done by the department at its Chesterfield office to Sheffield, and this will begin next month.

As a result 30 pre-press staff have opted to take redundancy, two will be redeployed to Sheffield and three will remain in a studio at Chesterfield.

The department is responsible for page setting and inputting and transmitting adverts for dozens of newspapers published by Wilfred Edmunds Ltd and North Notts Newspapers Ltd, including the Derbyshire Times and Worksop Guardian.

Over 12 weeks this work will be moved to an enlarged pre-press department being created at the Sheffield Star offices.

This will be done in five phases, with the first staff due to leave on June 29 and the last leaving on September 21.

Johnston Press had said there were 26 posts available at Sheffield, but Amicus union representative Kevin Bingham said that the terms and conditions on offer, coupled with the extra travelling costs, had meant that most people had opted to take redundancy.

Guy Phillips, managing director of Wilfred Edmunds, was unavailable for comment.