South East targets growth

England's most prosperous region, the south-east, is gearing up for a growth campaign that will put it on a par with the top ten regions in Europe.

This is the strategy to be set out this week by the new South East England Development Agency - and it comes against a background of relative decline. The south-east has been drifting behind European competitors and now ranks 23 out 77 on gross domestic product.

Chairman Allan Willett will call for greater efforts to attract new investment into what is already a £108bn economy. He complains of complacency and argues that much more could be made of both educational and technology resources.

The agency will propose a series of 'enterprise hubs', to be created across the region over the next several years as a focus for research and innovation. Meanwhile, at a recent CBI-sponsored meeting in the south-east the talk was of a love-hate relationship between London and everywhere else.

Too many talented people, it is felt, commute to London for work, leaving local businesses under-supplied and making local economies overly dependent on the capital's fortunes.

Elliott Chase