Tamzin Outhwaite taking acting ‘gap year’

Tamzin Outhwaite is taking "some time out" from acting to be with her children.

The ‘New Tricks’ actress split from her ‘Miranda’ actor husband, Tom Ellis in 2013 and since then she has found juggling work and caring for their daughters seven-year-old Florence and four-year-old Marnie tough because of work commitments.

She said: "I’m taking some time out, having the gap year I’ve never had. I’ll have as much time off as it takes to hang out with the girls because it feels like they need me at the moment. It got to the stage where I was worried about the hours I was doing. What with filming and my theatre commitments, I was literally working from 6am until 7pm or 8pm – and barely seeing my kids."

The 44-year-old blonde beauty reprised her role as DCI Sasha Miller for the 12th and final installment of BBC drama ‘New Tricks’, but has refused to take on any other work despite finding it "difficult" to turn down offers because she still loves acting.

She told the Daily Mirror newspaper: "I used to worry that people would forget me or I won’t work again after. But now I realise it doesn’t even matter; it’s much more important to be with my children. My kids are much more ­important than my career.

"I can’t predict what’s going to happen with that but I do know that my children are going to get older and if I’m not around to witness some of it then that’s going to be a sad thing.

"But I am finding it ­difficult when my agent calls with work and I have to turn it down because I do still love acting. My need to be with my daughters though is much stronger than my need to continue working."