Croydon Council plans to boost its position as the economic powerhouse of south London by ganging up with local councils to encourage cross-border business.

The council has submitted two bids to the Government’s Local Enterprise Partnerships(LEP) scheme to forge links with neighbouring councils and authorities running along Gatwick corridor to Brighton.

LEPs are deisgned to replace the previous Labour Government’s Regional Development Agencies, which Community Secretary Eric Pickles said gave local authorities “little reason to engage creatively with economic issues”.

Councillor Simon Hoar, Croydon’s cabinet member for economic development, said the new entities would make creating business links across the borough boundary both stronger and more flexible.

He said: “This is all about forging economic links.

“We have got trains in and out of London with people coming and doing business, and also people going down to Gatwick, so hopefully this will help tie us into a new economic area.

“You see chambers of commerce that gang together in areas and it gives you a bit of a bigger voice and co-ordination, so the idea is this will economically benefit us by having closer links with other authorities.”

More than 50 bids to create LEPs have been submitted by groups of councils across the country, which will be considered by ministers over the next few weeks before they hand out feedback.

Jeremy Frost, chairman of the Croydon branch of the Federation of Small Businesses, said he was concerned there may have lack of business engagement in some of the proposals.

He said: “We are today urging the Government to ensure that where there has been insufficient business input into the proposals that they are asked to go away and work further with business to set out a plan with enterprise involved.

“The FSB is the only national business organisation that is truly member-led and it is vital that our members – the local businesses supporting the local economy – have their interests properly represented.”

His concerns were echoed by Business Secretary Vince Cable, who said it was essential the new bodies provide true partnership between councils and business and did not just become talking shops.