Nine Chambers of Commerce have united to outline to the Government what they wanted from the Northern Powerhouse - and Cumbria will be adding its input at a key meeting next month.

The business groups that represent 1.4m workers across the North teamed up to issue a submission to the Treasury on issues such as transport, housing, skills and energy generation.

Nine chambers from across the North joined forces to present a joint submission to the Treasury’s Comprehensive Spending Review, to be announced in November.

The Chambers involved are: Barnsley & Rotherham Chamber of Commerce, Doncaster Chamber of Commerce, Greater Manchester Chamber of Commerce, Hull & Humber Chamber of Commerce, Liverpool Chamber of Commerce, Mid Yorkshire Chamber of Commerce, North East Chamber of Commerce, Sheffield Chamber of Commerce and West & North Yorkshire Chamber of Commerce.

Cumbria Chamber of Commerce is one of several not to be involved at this stage - including Cheshire and Lancashire, but says it will push the Cumbrian agenda at a key meeting next month.

Chamber Chief executive Rob Johnston said Cumbria would be represented at a meeting in Manchester alongside the Conservative conference on October 5th “to flesh out what is in the Northern Powerhouse for all the areas specifically.”

He added: “We have plans for joint initiatives with other chambers, for example working with Manchester to allow Cumbrian businesses to use Manchester office space.

In tourism, it is a well-known fact that most of our tourists come from a three hour radius. We are just an hour and a half from Manchester where there has been an exponential growth of young professionals with disposable income.”

Paul Smith from the Greater Manchester Chamber of Commerce said: “We tended to focus on the topics that were more likely to affect the more urban areas.

“The principal focus of the paper is on issues which would affect urban areas and large swathes of Cumbria and Lancashire are still rural communities.”

Among the key recommendations in the paper are energy generation, and skills funding, both of which are vital to Cumbria.

Suzanne Caldwell, director at Cumbria Chamber of Commerce, said: “It’s true that we haven’t been involved in this particular piece of work that is being presented to Parliament, but we are working very closely with Chambers from across the north to ensure that the Northern Powerhouse does have a positive effect on our area.

“It’s definitely not that we are not invited to the party, we’re still working very closely with Chambers across the North West and our chief executive has been in touch with Greater Manchester Chamber to discuss the issue of energy generation specifically.”