BUSINESSES are split over what should replace the region’s axed development agency - even though Chamber of Commerce bosses have backed an ‘East Lancashire partnership’.

The Government wants areas to submit bids for ‘local enterprise partnerships’ (LEPs) to take over from the North West Development Agency (NWDA) by March 2011.

The new bodies would be responsible for regeneration cash and dishing out business grants.

Council bosses across Lancashire are at loggerheads over what form LEPs should take, with the East Lancashire Chamber of Commerce favouring one that covers East Lancashire.

However, businesses are split over which approach is best.

Norman Tenray, managing director of building supplies firm OBAS UK, of Chapel Hill industrial estate, Longridge, said he favoured a Lancashire-wide LEP.

He said: “Councils are fighting among themselves at the moment and they are not listening to what businesses want.

“I would certainly prefer one LEP to cover the whole of Lancashire and everyone I have spoken to thinks the same.

“If we want to compete with Liverpool and Manchester as a region, we need to work together, not in factions.”

He said major issues, like transport, needed to be tackled by larger agencies.

John Edgington, general manager of biomedical company Gosselin, based on the Shadsworth business park in Blackburn, said the region needed a two-tier structure.

He said: “We need a regional body with a wide overview and then more localised ones underneath.

“The challenges facing businesses in Blackpool are completely different to those facing East Lancashire companies.”

Gary Rae, HR director of Greenbank Road, Blackburn-based Precision Polymer Engineering, which received NWDA money to expand, said: “With the NWDA, we dealt with people in Warrington and it did not make much difference.”

However, the East Lancashire Chamber of Commerce has already backed an LEP for the region.

Chief executive Mike Damms said: “All economic analysis points to a Pennine Lancashire bid.

“This is not about who can compete best with Manchester, Liverpool and Leeds but who can work best with Manchester, Liverpool and Leeds.”

LEP bids must be submitted to the Government by September 6.