In Focus - A LEP in the dark
Local Enterprise Partnership (LEP) groupings are starting to come together, even if no one is quite sure yet what they are being set up to do. It’s a bit like picking teams in the school playground and then deciding afterwards which sport to play.
The playground analogy can be taken further. In the East Midlands, local authorities in Nottinghamshire and Derbyshire have decided to play together and Leicestershire is kicking its shoes and wondering what it has done wrong. In the West Midlands, playground bully Birmingham has found it hard to attract friends into its gang.
We know that LEPs are being established to fulfil some of the regional economic support activities previously carried out by RDAs. They are supposed to be business-led public-private sector collaborations and might include professional services support groups, chambers of commerce and even airports as part of the partnership alongside one or more local authorities. It has been suggested there may be six or seven of these entities across the patch that Advantage West Midlands currently runs.
Exactly what they will be doing and how much money they will be given to do it is still unclear. A half baked idea is still in the oven.
David Hardman, managing director of Birmingham Science Park Aston, has described LEPs as "puddles" that will be too shallow to support innovation in the West Midlands. He fears they will fragment business support and harm start up businesses. Some of those attending a science and technology businesses round table I chaired this week echoed these fears.
They have to be given a chance, of course, and I suppose it is encouraging that so many people and organisations are throwing their hats into the ring. It suggests a high level of interest in the future of the regional economy and that can only be a good thing.
But it’s hard not to feel frustrated that so much time is being spent jockeying for position in regard to regional economic power instead of concentrating efforts on helping that economy to grow. Given the purdah period before the election and now the reorganisational impasse after it, at least six months has been wasted. During this time little has been initiated or developed that will help the Midlands or the businesses based here.
I sense from those I speak to in the local business community that the structure of business support is less important than the need to get something up and running as quickly as possible. While that’s not a view I share, I can certainly understand where they’re coming from.
They shouldn’t have much longer to wait. The LEP submissions have to be in by next month and the government’s spending review will be published on 20 October. This will set out spending plans up until 2015. Presumably LEP budgets will be announced at this stage at the latest.
At least then we will have some certainty about where we all stand. Until then we will have to amuse ourselves watching the "who wants to be in my gang?" routines being played out.
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