Church Farm has submitted a planning application to Wirral Council proposing the creation of a natural burial ground to the south of the popular attraction's land.

Just over 20 acres of fields will be given over to the "Forget-Me-Not" burial site, while existing stables will be converted into the "burial site reception building, associated access, car parking, infrastructure with ancillary facilities."

The application's Supporting Statement makes the case for natural burial grounds:

"Natural burial is a term used to describe the burial of human remains where the burial area creates habitat for wildlife or preserves existing habitats (woodland, species rich meadows, orchards, etc), sustainably managed farmland, in-situ or adjacent aquatic habitats or improves and creates new habitats which are rich in wildlife (flora and fauna)."

Which I reckon means people's remains are buried in a place where there are plenty of daisies to push up.

"Interest in natural death (we think 'natural burial' was meant here because, let's face it, sadly death is very natural) has grown as people have become increasingly concerned about the emissions and fuel-use associated with cremation, the use of stone for memorials (often shipped considerable distances from overseas quarries), or the use of formaldehyde for embalming, which has an adverse effect upon groundwater."

Blimey. Death is a messy and environmentally unfriendly business - though it appears Church Farm will be burying only urns, which presumably contain ashes, thus having no impact on the cremation emissions issue. But clearly people popping their clogs drives demand that is never going to go away

"At the national level," the Supporting Statement continues, "there is both an increasing and currently unmet demand for both natural urn and coffin burials. By 2035 population figures are set to rise to 73.2 million, with one person passing away every minute in the UK.

"Burial space in the UK is running out, with natural burial grounds being seen as a logical solution to tackling the increasing demand for burials, and the shortage of urban cemeteries due to development pressures for higher value land uses."

Burial space is running out? Perhaps, instead of building houses on local plots of land, developers should turn them into nice little urners...

If the "Forget-Me-Not" Burial Ground comes to pass, the opening hours will be 10am to 4pm in the winter months, and 9am to 6pm in summer. Burials will be limited to two per day, with a maximum of one burial in the morning and one in the afternoon. This is to ensure there is enough parking and not too much traffic.

Though some of it, up to twice a day, will be moving very slowly...