BUDGET airline Ryanair has announced two new routes from East Midlands Airport.
The new routes are to Marseille and Menorca and they will commence from next summer.
But the carrier has caused controversy after claiming the move would create up to 460 new jobs.
Richard Taylor, regional senior organiser for GMB Union, said: "It's good news for the East Midlands that Ryanair is creating new jobs and expanding at East Midlands Airport.
"However as is usually the case with Ryanair there are more smoke and mirrors than actual jobs but GMB are concerned that they're raising job expectations and we believe the total number of jobs created by the company in the East Midlands will be less than 150.
"It's also sad that this announcement and these jobs couldn't have been created when the 1,000 GMB workers at BMI were being made redundant a few months ago."
A spokeswoman for the airline confirmed that only 150 jobs will be directly created by expanding its routes and they will be shared between Manchester and Liverpool airports, as well as East Midlands Airport.
Five new routes were announced for Manchester, and two for Liverpool.
She said the jobs would primarily be in the areas of cabin crew, pilots and engineering.
The spokeswoman was unable to say how many of the jobs will go to East Midlands Airport.
The airline claimed up to 460 jobs will be created at East Midlands because studies by ACI say one "on site" job is created by every 1,000 passengers – and the two new routes will bring an extra 460,000 new passengers to the airport.
However, the airline does not plan to directly employ this number of people.
And it is unclear who will employ these people as the airport does not intend to directly employ new staff.
Ryanair was unavailable to respond to the GMB Union's claims when approached by the Post last night.
The airline will also have an extra aircraft at East Midlands Airport.
Ryanair's Michael Cawley said: "Ryanair is delighted to announce its summer 2013 schedule for East Midlands with 38 routes, including two new routes to and from Marseille and Menorca and growth on 17 other routes, which will grow Ryanair's passenger traffic at East Midlands by over 460,000 to over 2.3m passengers per annum and sustain up to 2,300 "on-site" jobs at East Midlands Airport."
Tim McDermott, EMA spokesman, said: "The news of the expansion by Ryanair is fantastic and we're pleased to see that our largest operator is continuing to grow. Ryanair have an incredibly strong customer base in the East Midlands and by announcing a further two new routes, an additional based aircraft and growth on so many of the airline's popular routes, they are demonstrating their commitment to both our passengers and the region.
"After the withdrawal of bmibaby, the airport worked hard to ensure that routes were quickly replaced and we can now say that at least 25 of the 30 destinations have been replaced by Ryanair, Jet2.com, Flybe and new operator Monarch."
