THE Business Centre Association (BCA) is this week calling on local authorities to enter into public/private partnerships to offer support to small firms.

The Government’s Pre-Budget Report outlined plans for the state to raise money from selling off its property estate.

The BCA claims that if councils were to sell off their own under-performing business centres, they could raise revenue and enter into partnerships with flexible workspace providers to provide low-cost accommodation for small firms.

This, it claims, would also help facilitate its proposed Flexible Space Voucher Scheme, under which SMEs would be entitled to receive BCA-accredited office or workspace accommodation for an initial one-year period at no cost, and at a reduced rate for a further two years.

Under the proposal, the vouchers would be funded either through profit-share management agreements between local authorities and private sector operators or from the sale of local-authority run business centres.

The UK scheme will be presented by the BCA to the Government.

Jennifer Brooke, executive director of the BCA, insists workspace centres have a number of advantages over those managed as part of the local authority portfolio. “Among other attributes, BCA members offer a higher level of ongoing workspace support, greater investment in services and new technology and generally create a more commercial working environment with fewer resultant business failures,” she said.

“The voucher scheme also provides a springboard from which start-ups can develop their business.”