By Nick Turner

Last updated at 09:43, Tuesday, 21 August 2012

The Government says a £3.5 million investment in Cumbria's rural economy will create 900 jobs and almost 500 new businesses.

Farming minister Jim Paice is in Cumbria today to promote the work of the Rural Growth Network, first announced in the budget in April.

He will visit the Blencathra Business Centre in Keswick which will be transformed into eight new work premises with business services including one-to-one business advice, online training, networking opportunities and access to superfast broadband.

This is just one of the Rural Growth Network’s ‘enterprise hubs’ planned for rural areas across Cumbria, which will deliver business support to a range of sectors, including food and drink, adventure sports and digital and creative enterprises.

The Keswick centre is one of a network of enterprise hubs planned across Cumbria that include:

• Eight new work premises at Blencathra Business Centre;
• Eight new work premises at Clawthorpe Hall;
• Twenty new work premises at Marl, Ulverston;
• Fourteen new work premises at Alston;
• Eight new work premises at Millom; and
• Ten new work premises at University of Cumbria, Ambleside;

The news has been welcomed by South Lakes MP Tim Farron who says the money will be an enormous help in creating jobs in rural Cumbria.

Mr Farron wrote to the county council in January asking them to make sure that Cumbria bid for the scheme and that the South Lakes was prominent within it.

Cumbria's bid to become a pilot Rural Growth Network was submitted by the Cumbria Local Enterprise Partnership (LEP) and has been named alongside Devon and Somerset, Swindon and Wiltshire, Northumberland and Durham, and Warwickshire as winning through to become pilot schemes.

The Rural Growth Network is part of the £165 million programme of measures that the Government is delivering to grow business and create new job prospects in rural areas.

Mr Farron said: "This is fantastic news and another success in our campaign to bring jobs and investment toCumbria. I am doing all I can to support the economy and provide well paid jobs for our community. Recently we helped to secure investments for GlaxoSmithKline in Ulverston and Gilkes in Kendal which will create 800 jobs and safeguard hundreds of others.

“This bid will also help us to unlock extra funding from the private sector. We can and must do even more however and that is why I will continue to work to make the South Lakes Cumbria's economic hub."

First published at 09:39, Tuesday, 21 August 2012
Published by http://www.nwemail.co.uk