QUESTIONS have been raised over how many of 500 jobs being created through a shopping complex expansion will go to local people.

The Dalton Park retail centre, near Murton, east Durham is about to undergo a second phase development.

The expansion is said to be worth £45m, with a seven-screen Cineworld cinema, a Morrisons supermarket, a KFC drive-through and a hotel all expected, along with a Pizza Express, Frankie and Benny’s and Prezzo.

A groundbreaking ceremony will take place on Friday (June 19) with Easington MP Grahame Morris, Murton Parish Council chairman Tom Pinkney, representatives of the construction company Bowmer and Kirkland and members of Dalton Park’s management team.

The work will take about a year to complete and it is estimated 500 jobs will be created during the construction and in the resulting retail units.

But today (Wednesday, June 17), at a full meeting of Durham County Council, Rona Hardy, a public representative on the East Durham Area Action Partnership (AAP), raised a question over the jobs on offer.

Ms Hardy said the extension was a “great opportunity” but asked what the council was doing to ensure local people could get the work.

Councillor Neil Foster, the council’s cabinet member for economic regeneration, said the authority was working on the issue.

In March, a Dalton Park announcement confirmed vacancies would be advertised through Job Centre Plus and on the shopping centre’s website, at dalton-park.co.uk

Speaking on another matter during the same meeting at County Hall, Durham, Cllr Foster said the council’s Durham Employment and Skills agency wanted to work with retailers to provide training to prepare people to apply for such work.

Such a scheme had proved successful with Tesco and Sainsbury’s at Bishop Auckland Shopping Park in St Helen Auckland, he said, meaning local people who completed a training course were guaranteed a job interview.

Dalton Park’s expansion has been in the planning for more than a decade and was approved despite concerns it would damage Seaham and Peterlee town centres, having won backing from local councillors, Mr Morris and 2,000 people who signed a petition.

The decision was referred to the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government, who opted not to “call in” the application.

Supporters say it will take Dalton Park to another level and make it a destination of choice for shoppers from across the region.