POLICY and planning body the North East Assembly has vowed to fight for the development of a deep-sea container terminal on the Tees that could bring 5,500 jobs to the region.

The Government issued a ports policy framework this week saying that southern ports were well-placed to meet capacity shortages for the next 20 years.

It said Teesport was only suitable for short-sea services, rather than receiving goods direct from the Far East, as it had hoped.

The port's owner, PD Ports, wants to invest £300m in a deep-sea container terminal which, it argues, would take millions of lorry miles off the roads and help bridge the economic divide between North and South.

The Government's ports policy is now the subject of a consultation exercise and the North East Assembly has vowed to fight the case for the port.

At a planning meeting this week, assembly members expressed concern at the Government's suggestion in its ports policy review and said they would be "responding strongly".

The assembly has been lobbying on behalf of the region for the port development and wrote to Ports Minister Stephen Ladyman in October, expressing concern that the Government was approving expansion plans at southern ports before it had developed a national ports policy.

Assembly chairman Alex Watson said: "The growth of the region's ports is important to the economic growth of the North-East.

"If more ships came to the North-East rather than the South, it would provide more jobs here and reduce congestion in the South, which can only be good news for the region and also offers a win-win situation all round."

Despite the Government's comments, the assembly said it would continue to strongly support the development of deep sea container facilities at Teesport.