LEPs - some further reflections

In my last post about Local Enterprise Partnerships I compared what I heard at the public meeting of my local LEP in Worcestershire with some of the research done by academics in a number of parts of the country and presented at Coventry Business School.

In reflecting on that some further questions have occurred to me.  From all that I've heard and read, it is clear that the purpose of the LEP is to stimulate enterprise, facilitate inward investment and encourage existing firms to stay and to help them expand, to help with infrastructure support and lastly in Worcestershire's vision and objectives to, 'Invest in the skills of our workforce ensuring that provision is responsive to business needs, and relevant to future growth and business opportunities.'

One of the speakers at the LEP conference was a local entrepreneur, who spoke impressively about economic growth and new jobs coming from new businesses and from entrepreneurship (though his business employs only four people in Worcester and presumably the production is outsourced, we know not where).  Concern was also expressed during a presentation on apprenticeships about unemployment amongst young people.  I guess my question is about the connection between the activity to encourage businesses and the number and type of jobs.

Worcestershire County Council's Economic Strategy, refreshed in June 2010 for the economic downturn, still speaks of delivering the priority in the County's Sustainable Community Strategy of "Economic success that is shared by all".  I am not criticising the LEP when I raise this question because I am not convinced that previous policies and bodies had made any greater connection between trying to help business growth and the types of jobs that might be secured.  Much play was made in previous West Midlands regional and the County economic strategies about high skill, high value added jobs, and I well recall being unpopular when raising the question of a former colleague about work for those who did or could not aspire to those types of jobs.  I do recall a later change of tone on this, particularly in relation to the refresh of the county's strategy.

There was talk at the LEP conference about attracting hi-tech, advanced manufacturing, professional firms, distribution and other quality employers.  One criticism from the study presented at Coventry University is that all LEPs are trying to attract hi-tech, advanced manufacturing and usually also bio-technology, nano-science and the like, and that clearly not everyone can go for the same things.  There does appear to be some differentiation in Worcestershire, and some play was made of the motorway network running through the County, both as a plus point for distribution and other firms needing good communications, and also as a way of promoting Worcestershire, which at present a large number of people drive through but are not told anything about it.

There is clearly a lot of work to be done on making the connections with the skills firms need, and the apprenticeship programme may help that.  There are also questions about the types of jobs that will be created and any influence there can be through the types of industries that may be encouraged.  Some of these questions about jobs being for people rather than people for jobs should not be forgotten even if much is also down to wider policy and macro-economic issues that are not within the power of those locally to influence.