“The early Enterprise Zone agreement has also given business confidence to take long-term decisions in those areas. The Regional Growth Fund bid in round two was successful and the council knows it will not win every round of competitive funding it bids for.
“Nonetheless, we believe the strength of our most recent (unsuccessful) RGF bid was not fully appreciated by government and we have already had discussions with them about possibilities which might be available in the near future.”
The deal of around £130m comprises five different available pots of money, which total £138m.
They include the £75m economic development fund, the £25m RGF money, £21m from a European investment in cities fund, a £10m Urban Broadband fund and a £7m Growing Places fund.
The Post understands that all but the £100m economic development and the RGF funds are guaranteed and not conditional on bids.
Liverpool council opposition Liberal Democrat group leader Cllr Richard Kemp said it would probably be the case, if successful, that Liverpool got its City Deal money at the same time as the other eight core cities, adding there was “no advantage” to Liverpool in bypassing the referendum on whether to have a mayor.
And he added he hoped the City Deal bids would fare better than the ill-fated £52m RGF bid.
He added: “My understanding is it failed for two reasons: one being it was not very good, but secondly because it did not show all the Merseyside conurbation joined up in the way that Greater Manchester is, which has managed to get everything going and then create an open and transparent ‘combined authority’, legal entity with all 10 authorities on it, rather than our ‘city region cabinet’.
“Theirs is properly accountable.” A council spokesman said that the Liverpool City Region would move towards combined authority status “when the Government decides to legislate for it” for Merseyside.
That suggests the region’s individual councils appear resigned to being unable to agree a deal among themselves – as the system can already be introduced without the need for any additional legislation.
This lack of co-operation has traditionally been regarded as a key failure of Merseyside, in contrast to the more joined-up approach in Manchester.
