LOCAL Enterprise Partnerships have been described as ‘puddles’ that will be too shallow to support innovation in the West Midlands, will fragment business support and harm startup businesses.
David Hardman, managing director of Birmingham Science Park Aston, which nurtures university spin out companies and other knowledge-based enterprises, said the creation of up to six LEPs in the region would mean critical mass was lost.
He said: “Addressing the fragmentation of the support provided by AWM is essential if fledgling knowledge-based businesses are to lead the region’s economic recovery.
Mr Hardman said LEPs would dilute support for innovation: “Innovation ecologies are innately unstable if one or more of the components of the intellectual capital is weak or missing. The creation of the current administrative boundaries led to the UK innovation ‘lake’ being divided into RDA ‘ponds’ that often cannot support complete knowledge-economy eco-systems. The latest re-think takes the ponds and divides them into Local Enterprise Partnership ‘puddles’.
“In the absence of sufficiently large geographies, it will not be possible to cluster competencies and direct funding and commercial expertise in an effective fashion.
“The critical mass and sphere of influence that currently exists will be lost, which will mean that as a region, the West Midlands could fall further behind other parts of the UK and be unable to catalyse change and drive growth.
“LEPs are to be a fact of life and the degree of division will be defined by the final number of LEPs we will have within the region, but I believe our economy will be best served and supported if the existing infrastructure is utilised, which provides valuable mechanisms and impetus to drive the knowledge economy.
“I firmly believe that the most effective approach will be to bring together the network of science parks, innovation centres and incubators across the current AWM region to provide the necessary aggregation channels, transcending LEP administrative boundaries.”
The Government wants LEPs to be formed by local authorities and businesses around natural ‘economic geographies’. Pressure from Birmingham City Council and Birmingham Chamber of Commerce to create a ‘super-LEP’ including Birmingham and the whole of the Black Country has been resisted by neighbouring authorities.
The four Black Country councils intend to form a standalone LEP, and Coventry is to join with Warwickshire.
