North West Development Agency scrapped

The body, designed to stimulate growth and help firms, was axed in Tuesday’s Budget and is set to be replaced by a ‘local enterprise partnership’.

Business leaders now hope East Lancashire will get more say over where economic growth money goes.

They believe power should be handed to Regenerate Pennine Lancashire (RPL), the organisation set up last year to spearhead regeneration.

Michael Ranson, chairman of RPL governing body PLACE and Conservative leader of Ribble Valley Council, said: “When we set RPL up, I spoke to the people who are now Conservative ministers.

"The feedback I got was that it was the kind of organisation they wanted for economic regeneration, rather than the development agencies.

“Hopefully, if the NWDA’s role disappears, things will be much better for us and we will be masters of our own destiny.”

The Warrington-based NWDA was set up in 1999 to drive economic regeneration across the region.

Between 2003 and 2009, Lancashire received £330million from the NWDA.

East Lancashire Chamber of Commerce boss Mike Damms warned that scrapping the NWDA, a key part of Conservative policy, was not a simple solution as it also dished out EU money.

Businesses which received NWDA cash were today split on the agency’s worth.

Gary Rae, HR director at Blackburn-based Precision Polymer Engineering, said: “The NWDA’s location in Warrington has never been an issue and whenever we have needed them, such as when we expanded, they have been great.”

But Alec Cassie, managing director of BCW Engineering in Burnley, said: “There are examples of businesses getting grants and them spending them on offices abroad, rather than on equipment to create new jobs.

"That frustrates me.”

A white paper will be produced later this year on how the NWDA will be replaced.

Chief Executive Steven Broomhead pledged to continue delivering economic support to the region until the future was resolved.