Coventry and Staffordshire reveal Enterprise Zones mission
COVENTRY Airport and a ‘business triangle’ in north Staffordshire are the latest candidates for Enterprise Zone status.
Coventry and Warwickshire Local Enterprise Partnership wants a planned redevelopment at the airport to be the home of one of 10 new EZs which Chancellor George Osborne promised in March’s Budget.
And Stoke-on-Trent and Staffordshire LEP wants to designate 150 hectares of land at three sites to be part of the Government’s business initiative.
In April, airport bosses announced plans for a £250m regeneration project involving infrastructure work on the airport itself and the A45 as well as the construction of a nearby business park, all of which is aimed at creating 10,000 jobs.
The LEP wants this site to be the focus of the ‘Coventry and Warwickshire Gateway Enterprise Zone’ which, if approved by Government, would benefit from tax breaks, reduced planning restrictions and other investment advantages such as super fast broadband.
Two other sites were also considered for the EZ application, the LEP’s board said after its meeting yesterday, which now has until June 30 to submit the formal application.
Elsewhere in the region, LEP bosses in Staffordshire have indentified three plots to make one, large EZ centred on the Etruria Valley, with specialised spurs at Keele University Science Park and the Hadleigh Business Park, in Blythe Bridge.
The body estimates that EZ status will mean more than £250m of business rates will go back into providing local services, creating 14,000 jobs by 2015.
The LEP has previously said this EZ, combined with two successful bids for money from the Regional Growth Fund from Stafford and Middleport, outside the EZ’s patch, would create a large area of the county ripe for development.
- Maitland Hyslop, managing director of internet provider Internet Central, which is based at Keele Science Park, has been appointed inaugural chairman of the Stoke and Staffordshire LEP.
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