Fears have been raised over the long-term future of one of Cumbria’s main business incubation centre after the University of Cumbria revealed it would be pulling out.

Paul Nedved, the Carlisle City Council member for Stanwix Urban who chairs the authority's environment and economy overview and scrutiny panel, has made the comments after the university announced it would not be renewing its lease at the Business Incubation Centre (BIC) in Carlisle city centre.

The centre, at Paternoster Row, has been described as an "incubation centre" for business and several companies have started there. It is also home to the university’s business school.

The building has been used for teaching since 1992 by the university and its predecessors. In November 2013 it became a BIC through a partnership between the university and the city council – offering firms a place where they could build links with the institution and take advantage of their expertise.

However, the university’s lease has expired and it has served notice to vacate with staff in the process of withdrawing from the building.

It is now set to move this part of its setup to its main campuses in the city in Brampton Road, Stanwix, and Fusehill Street, off London Road.

"The move enables us to better utilise our space to focus on our core mission and priorities for growth, addressing regional skills needs, while ensuring we are positioned for future sustainability and success," Sandra Booth, pro vice chancellor for business and enterprise at the university, explained.

"Increasingly, the nature of our business interactions means the business development team are spending more time mobile working within businesses, utilising our distributed campus sites and partners’ facilities and working off-site."

Mr Nedved though is worried about this development. He pointed out that the BIC received a £100,000 investment in 2013 and is worried that it will not have a strong future in the long-term.

He added: "A lot of taxpayers money went into it and just less than five years since that the university has decided not to renew its lease. It is not showing a future commitment."

Mr Nedved was also annoyed that he found out about the move when he saw posts about it on Facebook.

"It is the sort of thing we need to be hearing, we are 100 per cent behind the development of the city," he said.

Mr Glover said the authority had held a meeting with several firms which were interested in moving into the BIC, including some which had been in there previously.

He added: "I fully believe that as one door closes another opens. Once we became aware that the university was not going to renew its lease at the BIC our teams began looking at trying at finding other uses for the building."

Mr Glover believes that it could become a hub for creative and digital business.

"We have got some brilliant graduates (in these fields) who come from the University of Cumbria, we would like as many of them as possible to stay," he said.

The situation at the BIC will be discussed at Carlisle's at a scrutiny panel meeting on Thursday, October 19.