BUSINESS Secretary Vince Cable paid a visit to Dorset and praised WSX Enter-prise’s support for company owners.

The Liberal Democrat Cabinet member told company owners that the energy and drive of small businesses will get the UK economy going again.

Mr Cable was a guest at a breakfast-time event in Hamworthy organised by business support specialists WSX Enterprise, with Annette Brooke, MP for Mid Dorset and Poole North.

Speaking before his talk, he said: “The support that WSX Enterprise has been able to organise for company owners in Dorset is brilliant.

“It is something that is not happening in many other areas of the country, and it is a really good model.”

Referring to the WSX’s Rural-Net network, Mr Cable said: “It is small business that will drive the recovery of our economy, and we should be doing everything possible to promote it. Rural-Net is an excellent self-starting initiative.”

Mr Cable said Dorset was one of the areas best placed to see an early turn-around of the business tide.

He added: “Dorset has a very healthy entrepreneurial culture, and there is a lot happening here.”

Mr Cable said: “At the moment we are going through a very difficult time, and the problems are on quite a different scale to those we have experienced in previous downturns.

“It is as if, four years ago, the country had a massive heart attack. We have had emergency treatment, but we are still not in great shape.”

Action was vital, he said, on training for young people who did not go on to higher education or university.

He added: “We are introducing apprenticeships on a large scale – with a 60 per cent growth in apprenticeships in the last two years.”

Major issues, said Mr Cable, were getting finance flowing to businesses, eliminating unnecessary regulation and decentralising Government decision making, to return more powers to local level.

The aim of all the government’s efforts, Mr Cable said, was ‘an economy based on real wealth creation, not on the sort of artificial growth we have had in the past.’ See businesseventsindorset.co.uk for details of other WSX events.