FIRMS in South Lakeland stand to get a greater voice and access to a wider range of training and other services under radical plans to merge several business organisations.

Kendal and Lancaster chambers of commerce, trade and industry are considering plans to join forces with their counterparts in Carlisle and West Cumbria, and the Carlisle Business Forum.

A merger would create a 'super' chamber, representing businesses across much of Cumbria and North Lancashire.

The new body would employ full-time staff, run training courses and seminars, and offer a raft of services, including regular member briefings and group meetings for tourism, retailing, industry and commerce sectors.

The driving force behind the merger plan is the British Chambers of Commerce, which wants a network of accredited and highly active local chambers, each fully staffed with at least 1,000 members and a £1 million annual turnover.

At present, the Kendal and South Lakeland chamber has around 100 members, while Lancaster has 340-strong membership and some 900 businesses belong to Carlisle Business Forum.

None of the chambers are big enough to achieved accreditation status on their own, but by joining forces they would meet BCC demands and create an influential organisation to represent business interests.

Members of both the Kendal and Lancaster chambers of commerce, along with the Carlisle Business Forum, are due to hold extraordinary general meetings in November to approve the merger.

The call for a merger is not new: a previous plan to link up Kendal, Carlisle and West Cumbria with Quality Guild failed to get off the ground due to a lack of willpower.

But Kendal chamber of commerce president Richard Knowles believes the latest merger plan has a much better chance of succeeding, partly because of pressure from the BCC.

He warned if the area did not have a BCC-accredited organisation in place by April next year, than rivals in the North West and North East would be free to recruit in Cumbria, poaching businesses and threatening the future of existing chambers.

Mr Knowles said he was anxious to retain a separate identity for the Kendal chamber, which would still hold quarterly luncheon meetings and have a small budget to help fund projects such as the South Lakeland Local Purchasing Initiative.

Kendal would also keep its own office, but for the first time it could call on staff from an enlarged chamber to carry out new initiatives and launch recruitment drives.

Mr Knowles said Kendal would play an important role in the enlarged chamber, since it would act as a test bed to demonstrate the business benefits of the new set-up.

"The new organisation would need to show how it could grow a small chamber like Kendal.

It would be the benchmark for other areas of the county to see how this organisation can help them," he said.

Reaction to the merger plan has been mixed.

Peter Hensman, managing director of Kendal pump and turbine manufacturer Gilbert, Gilkes and Gordon, said the Kendal chamber had always feared that Lancaster would 'swallow up" Kendal if a merger went ahead.

Haydn Munslow, partner at Talbot Insurance Brokers, said chamber members might have to choose between buying services from the new organisation or Business Link.

John Ashford of John Ashford Associates said the Lancaster was a very active chamber, and joining forces was the way forward for Kendal.