Commenting on exchanges in the Assembly today during Questions to the DETI Minister, TUV Leader Jim Allister expressed amazement that an Executive which likes to trumpet that Invest NI has ‘promoted’ 25,000 jobs since 2011, cannot say how many of those jobs actually came into existence and still exist. What is there to hide?

“How is it that we have a DETI minister who does not know how many jobs Invest NI – whose Chief Executive she rewarded with approval of a £35,000 performance bonus – has really created. She has been in office for years – did she never think to ask? How can you judge the latest promise of another 25,000 jobs without knowing how the makers of that promise actually delivered in the last Programme for Government?

“One reality we do know is that under this government unemployment has spiralled from 26,000 in 2007 to 61,000 today!”