IT has looked down on boardroom discussions and chimed countless hours during business meetings for more than 100 years.

And now Hampshire Chamber of Commerce’s gilt-decorated bracket clock has a new home in the Mayor’s parlour at Southampton City Council.

The chamber has given the clock to the city as a gift as it prepares to leave its four-story listed building in Bugle Street, Southampton, for a more modern and central hub.

Hampshire Chamber of Commerce chief executive Stewart Dunn joined Sandeep Sesodia, chairman of the chamber’s Southampton Business Board, to present the clock to Mayor of Southampton Linda Norris.

He said: “The clock is a small but tangible part of the history of our chamber.

“We were keen to find the best home for it as we move to more modern offices at the Sir James Matthews Building at Southampton Solent University in September.

“The clock is a gift to the city and will be on view to anyone visiting the mayor’s parlour.”

The ebonised bracket clock weighs 15 kilos and still remains in full voice when it strikes an eight-bell grande sonnerie with Westminster chimes.

It was originally presented by members of Southampton Chamber of Commerce to JE Le Feuvre when he retired from the secretary’s position in March 1885.

And since 1964 the clock has stood on the mantlepiece in the boardroom at Bugle House, which is the chamber’s seventh home since it was established in 1851.

Cllr Norris said: “The chamber and the city have close connections that go right back to the growth of the port and the start of the railway links that helped stimulate economic growth around the middle of the 19th century.”