A senior union representative has resigned from the Northern Ireland Economic Research Centre in Belfast following a dispute over remarks made by its director.
Mr Terry Carlin, a member of the management committee, is the latest to criticise comments made by director, Mr Graham Gudgin, who claimed all 80,000 new jobs created in the North during the last 25 years had gone to Catholics.
Mr Carlin, who is the Northern Ireland officer of the Irish Congress of Trade Unions, said he could not "in conscience, serve on NIERC when there are clear divisions between the director and myself".
"This decision is the result of dissatisfaction with the way in which the centre has been moving in recent years. My dissatisfaction has culminated in recent statements and articles by the director on fair employment, which have been challenged as being inaccurate by other economists and, in any event, certainly do not represent either my own personal views - nor those of Irish Congress of Trade Unions."