Telewest is targeting high-speed internet access

It made a net loss of �506m ($798m) in the past financial year, an improvement on the �801m loss the previous year.

But it also wrote off a large sum because the value of its assets had fallen - and that took the overall loss to �2.2bn.

Like other telecoms companies Telewest went on a spending spree at the height of the hi-tech boom and its assets are no longer worth what it paid for them.

High-speed connections

The company is currently trying to restructure its debts of �3.5bn and said it expected to make several hundred more job cuts once this was completed.

Talks are still going on with creditors but managing director, Charles Burdick would not predict when they would end.

"I'm anxious to do this as quickly as possible. It takes a lot of different parties to come to the table, but there are no major obstacles in place," he said.

The company has already cut 1,450 jobs to try to rein in costs.

"We ended the year at just over 9,000 employees, and we would expect that to be reduced in the range of several hundred," Mr Burdick said, although he thought the majority of cuts would be achieved by people leaving and not being replaced.

Telewest has been concentrating on selling high-speed internet access to the homes in its cabled areas and the company said it would continue to focus on that part of the business.