An announcement that 1,000 jobs are to be created in Belfast by US company Stream has been defended, following revelations that in 2011 it downsized operations in L'Derry, which at one stage had employed over 1,000 people.

First and deputy First Ministers Peter Robinson and Martin McGuinness made the announcement yesterday.

Mr McGuinness said: "The jobs at this centre will benefit the whole economy through the generation of £14m per annum in additional salaries. Once recruitment has completed Stream expects to employ more than 1,700 people here."

But UTV has quoted Sinn Féin Foyle MLA Maeve McLaughlin as saying: "Why could these jobs not have been located in Derry to compensate for the recent redundancies? The number of jobs announced by Stream for Belfast today is almost equivalent to those lost in Derry.

"From the announcement made today it does not appear that any particular skill base different than what was already available at its Derry facility is required.

"Are we to see in another ten years when the claw-back period for the present grants run out that Stream will run down its operation in Belfast, move somewhere else in the North, employ a similar number of employees and be grant-aided once again?"

Northern Ireland Socialist Party spokesperson Paddy Meehan has claimed: "in reality these jobs have been shifted from Derry to Belfast. Not a single job has been created. No doubt this will be used to say the economy has turned a corner when all that has happened is these jobs have been re-created down the road.

"Effectively, Stream has been given in excess of £3m of public money to sack workers in Derry and switch to Belfast where they will continue to pay poverty wages, with no job security."

Mr Meehan claimed Peter Robinson and Martin McGuinness had "wasted millions of public money jet setting across the world and have failed to create jobs for over 100,000 people in Northern Ireland looking for work."

(IT/CD)