Go-ahead to create 1,500 gas jobs

More than 1,500 new jobs are expected to be created in the North Sea oil and gas industry after the Government yesterday gave the go-ahead to huge pipeline and off-shore platform contracts.

The work includes contracts worth pounds 300m to build platforms for the new Shearwater gas field. Amec will carry out construction of the installations at the company's Wallsend yard on the Tyne, at Hartlepool and on Teeside.

Alastair Rodgers, director of the Northern Offshore Federation which represents 200 firms in the industry, said the decision would "certainly safeguard jobs and sustain the range of activity which keeps our companies and their suppliers in business".

Ian Lang, President of the Board of Trade, said companies would get the chance to bid for further contracts for the Elgin and Franklin fields which could total pounds 2.5bn. He rejected lobbying by groups to run the pipeline from the new fields to Teeside, siding with Shell and Elf, Shearwater's developers, who had wanted to run the 200- mile pipeline to the gas facility at Bacton off the Norfolk coast.