AN offshore firm is cutting North-East jobs less than three years after grand plans were unveiled to employ hundreds of staff in the region.

Drilling equipment firm MH Wirth is shutting its engineering offices at Preston Farm Industrial Estate, near Stockton, after suffering a lull in work caused by the falling oil price.

The changes are expected to see 15 workers and three contractors lose their posts.

Reports in Norway claim the cuts are part of plans to axe 750 roles across Akastor, the Norwegian oil services investment company that owns MH Wirth and was created out of the separation of Aker Solutions into two independent firms.

The Northern Echo also attempted to contact Akastor’s sister firm Frontica Business Solutions, which has a base at Preston Farm, to find out if it was affected by the changes, but did not receive a reply.

That division provides IT, finance, accounting and human resources work.

Back in September 2012, when MH Wirth’s site was still part of Aker, bosses said they wanted to double its presence in Stockton, by creating up to 100 jobs through increased drilling work.

At the time, they hailed the region’s “proud industrial heritage and huge engineering competence base,” as the perfect site for engineers to work on drilling equipment, including deepwater drilling packages for offshore drilling rigs and drillships around the world.

However, a MH Wirth spokeswoman said: “We are undergoing a reorganisation of the company, and unfortunately the Stockton office will be closed down.

“The plan is to close it halfway through this year.

“We cannot comment on jobs and if any are being re-located; that process is going though HR at the moment.”

MH Wirth has offices in Aberdeen and London, but the spokeswoman refused to confirm if any North-East posts will be relocated to those sites.

It employs more than 4,000 staff worldwide.

The office closure comes as another blow to the region’s offshore supply chain, with Darlington-based DeepOcean UK readying itself to make 45 redundancies, blaming the falling oil price and a lack of Government support for UK companies to win work in British waters ahead of foreign rivals.

Reef Subsea UK has also had to play down fears over the future of its 80-strong regional workforce after its Norwegian parent filed for bankruptcy.

Bosses were forced to deny cuts, saying its UK division is not in administration and is a separate legal entity to Norwegian-based Reef Subsea AS, remaining under the control of its directors.