STEELMAKING in the North-East was dealt another blow today with the revelation that over 400 jobs could be set to go at four Corus plants - only weeks after 3,000 jobs were put at risk by the same firm.

Corus said it is making 2,000 redundancies in its Long Products division due to steel sales plummeting in the economic downturn, and The Northern Echo understands that 113 jobs are at risk at its Skinningrove site and 150 at Lackenby.

A further 156 jobs will go in Hartlepool and nine in Darlington.

And it comes as the second massive blow from Corus, which could also be forced to mothball its Redcar Teesside Cast Products (TCP) plant - which employs 3,000 people, if a buyer for the site cannot be found, or orders cannot be secured to replace the deal with an international steel-buying consortium, which tore up its agreement to take 80 per cent of the site's output in May. The deal was due to last until 2014.

Today's announcement was described by unions as "yet another devastating blow for Teesside".

Read the full story in The Northern Echo tomorrow.