The Director of Regeneration and Place has approved the Council’s response to the consultation by the Liverpool City Region Combined Authority on the emerging Spatial Development Strategy for the Liverpool City Region as set out in Appendix 1 to the accompanying report.

The Liverpool City Region Combined Authority (CA) has consulted on the latest stage of preparation of what will become on adoption the Liverpool City Region Spatial Development Strategy (SDS). Once adopted the SDS will become part of the statutory Development Plan for Wirral and will form part of the planning policy framework for assessing planning applications in Wirral. The consultation period ran from November 2023 until February 2024.  Due to ongoing work connected with the examination of the Wirral Local Plan, the CA has agreed that the Council’s response can be submitted after the deadline for comments, given that this is a non-statutory stage in the process. This is a key decision as the SDS has the potential to affect all Wards. The recommendations enable the Council to respond to the consultation by the CA on the emerging SDS for the Liverpool City Region. 

The only other option is not to submit a response to this consultation.  However, as the Liverpool City Region Spatial Development Strategy will become part of the Development Plan for Wirral on adoption, not responding to this consultation could mean that the Council’s position is not fully reflected in the Spatial Development Strategy.