‘Historic’ day as LEP gets down to business

THE first meeting of Greater Manchester’s new Local Enterprise Partnership (LEP) took place yesterday on what chairman Mike Blackburn described as “a historic day” for the city-region.

The board, which consists of nine private sector members and four local authority chiefs were briefed on several major initiatives including the second round of regional growth fund bids, the Airport City Enterprise Zone and a new £50m bid to the Department for Transport via the Local Sustainable Transport Fund.

“The first meeting was very much about setting the priorities for the board going forward and establishing clear channels of communication with the appropriate agencies and authorities,” said Mr Blackburn, the regional boss of BT.

“Private sector-led, we will be the voice of business and will make recommendations to both local and central government about the future development of the city.”

During its first meeting, the board was briefed by Manchester City Council leader Sir Howard Bernstein on progress of the Airport City Enterprise Zone, where consultation work is currently being undertaken on where the zone’s borders should be set.

Sir Howard said that current government guidance was that Enterprise Zones should not be much larger than 150 hectares, which could mean that plans for part of the Airport City development could fall outside Enterprise Zone status – depending on the size of the proposed development.

He said that more definitive proposals would be presented back to the LEP board within the next six weeks.

It was also briefed by Transport for Greater Manchester on a £50m bid due to be submitted to the Department for Transport’s Local Sustainability Transport Fund within the next fortnight. Some £5m of this is for a specific project to encourage cycling in the City Region via the construction of secure cycle stores near stations and a facility in the city centre containing lockers, showers and changing areas.

The remaining £45m would cover a range of spending on initiatives to boost public transport use via the introduction of smart cards, smart networks displaying real-time information and improving network efficiency.

The board was also asked by Transport for Greater Manchester to support the High Speed 2 initiative and to lobby Government to push through legislation that would take the line all the way to Manchester in one swoop, as opposed to current proposals where legislation will get the line to Birmingham during the current parliament before a second round covering the northern spurs to Manchester and Leeds would be undertaken during the next parliament.

Manchester City Council leader Sir Richard Leese said there was “a bigger risk in a two-stage process” as the initiative could run out of momentum.

Mr Blackburn said that the LEP recognised the project’s importance to the city region. “We would want to get involved in that,” he added.