HALTON Council is set to share in £10m of government funding to encourage the planting of new trees across the borough.

Environment Secretary Therese Coffey announced the winning bids to the Local Authority Treescapes Fund (LATF) and the Urban Tree Challenge Fund (UTCF), with 57 local authorities set to share in the pot of money.

Halton will receive £148,402 which will be used to encourage the planting of new trees as part of efforts to combat climate change and rebuild lost tree stocks.

In addition to the money provided to councils for tree planting, a further £10m has also been provided organisations as part of the Woods into Management Forestry Innovation Funds and the Tree Production Innovation Fund. The fund is designed to support projects that explore new technologies and business models to improve tree planting stocks and woodland resilience.

The LATF is a grant scheme for local authorities to restore tree cover in non-woodland areas which may have been impacted by issues such as disease, habitat degradation or ageing tree stock. The fund is focused on replanting trees in areas outside of woodlands, including parklands, riparian zones, urban areas, beside roads and footpaths as well as trees in hedgerows and field boundaries.

The UTCF is a government grant which aims to ‘level up’ access to nature across the country, planting trees in socially deprived urban areas with low canopy cover, in proximity to healthcare and educational facilities. The UTCF supports planting of large ‘standard’ trees in urban areas – making an immediate impact to communities.

Ms Coffey told MPs: “Today we announced £20 million of funding to improve tree planting stocks, woodland resilience, domestic timber production and to accelerate tree planting across England."

She added: "These initiatives will see hundreds of thousands of trees planted in communities across England. They represent another step forward in the Government’s drive to treble tree planting rates across England by the end of this Parliament.”