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Park Strife from the Sunday Herald 15th November 2002
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Park Strife from the Sunday Herald 15th November 2002
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Sunday Herald 15 November 2002
Park strife
Seventy years ago, a Perthshire aristocrat called Sir Douglas Ramsay was the victim of a sordid plot by landowners, who vilified him as a dangerous socialist, a class traitor and a homosexual. The landed gentry were out to get him because he was doing the unforgivable: challenging their untrammelled right to use the mountains and glens that shape
the country as their private playground. As chairman for the Scottish Forestry Reserve Committee, Ramsay urged the government in the early 1930s to take over and run the Cairngorm mountain range as a park for the
nation. In the following decade he famously chaired a government committee which also came out in favour of national parks. But his attempts to secure Scotland's finest landscapes for the public good were, in the end, defeated by the landowners. Since those days, sadly, history
has often repeated itself, culminating last week in the creation of a neutered and withered entity already known not as the Cairngorms National Park but the Cairngorms National Farce. A park covering the Cairngorms is now scheduled to come into existence next March, shorn of proper planning powers and shrunk to fit political rather than
natural boundaries. The outcome, after so many decades, has induced fury and despair among campaigners. According to Bob Aitken, vice-chairman of the Scottish Countryside Activities Council, the Cairngorms National Park is a 'travesty' that will be scorned
around the world. 'It will be nothing less than a tragic betrayal of high aspirations dating back nearly a century,' he said. 'We could have had a national park of authentic world quality. It's got all the right
elements -- a mountain core of undoubted international conservation value, in a superb setting of upland glens and rural communities. Instead we seem inescapably on course to end up with a lame duck park, with a
mangled boundary and pitifully truncated planning powers. And all, it seems, because of petty political power games and thrawn sectoral interests.' Attempts to introduce national parks in Scotland have always been subverted by landowners anxious to protect their private estates. But when the late
Donald Dewar stood on the shores of Loch Lomond in 1997 and announced that one of the first acts of the new Scottish parliament would be to establish national parks, hopes were raised. The Conservative gov
ernment's idea that the mountains could be protected by voluntary partnerships with landowners was consigned to the scrapheap and the state conservation agency, Scottish Natural Heritage (SNH), was asked to come
up with plans for national parks around Loch Lomond and the Cairngorms. On one front, progress was smooth. Nearly everyone wanted a park covering Loch Lomond and the Trossachs to be established, with full planning powers and an
agreed boundary. And as a result Scotland's first national park came into being earlier this year, to widespread acclaim. But for the Cairngorms -- Scotland's premier mountain range, near Aviemore in the central Highlands -- the road was rough. The problem was that the
majority of the range sits within the bounds of Highland Council, which has historically been opposed to a national park on the grounds that it poses a threat to its power. The council -- along with concerned
land owners -- had to be won over to the idea. What happened next was 'a scandalous political stitch-up', according to Mike Rumbles, the Liberal Democrat MSP for West Aberdeenshire and Kincardine, who
spoke to the Sunday Herald last month. Some people allege that the deal between SNH and Highland Council was done at a meeting in Battleby, near Perth, in September 1998 -- although that is
denied by SNH. But what is clear is that as SNH drew up its proposals, an understanding was reached between the agency, the council and the Scottish Executive. The essence of the deal was that Highland Council got to keep control of planning developments in the park in return for withdrawing its opposition to the
concept as a whole. This meant that, deprived of planning powers, the board that would run the Cairngorms National Park would be much weaker than its equivalent in Loch Lomond and the Trossachs. 'The forces of the government and the forces of the Highland mafia did a deal,' one insider told the Sunday Herald. 'It was a classic fudge. Sometimes the
flavour of the fudge was altered, but it was always a fudge.' The key figure in the negotiations was Peter Peacock, who was convener of Highland Council from 1995 to 1999. Originally an independent councillor, he
joined the Labour Party and was elected as a Highlands and Islands MSP. He is now deputy minister for finance and public services. He has persistently lobbied, in public and in private, to ensure that the council retained control of planning, in the belief that this was what local
people needed. So successful was he that when SNH published its arrangements for the Cairngorms park in 1999, it suggested that Highland Council be allowed to keep most of its planning powers. Unsurprisingly,
this proposal was accepted by the Scottish Executive -- but the battle was by no means over. There was overwhelming public hostility to the arrangement. Out of 463 responses to the Executive's consultation on the park, 225 argued for stronger planning powers and only 52 backed the Executive line. This
caused a remarkable -- and so far unreported -- wobble among ministers. A meeting involving Peacock and the deputy environment minister, Allan Wilson, accepted advice from officials that the national park should be given
proper planning powers. But this agreement was upset when the Scottish parliament's rural development committee, after a meeting in Kingussie, came out against full planning powers for the park. This enabled Peacock to reopen the argument ... and win it. Hence the Cairngorms National Park that was finally agreed by the parliament late on Thursday
was one that will have to share its planning powers with Highland Council. 'It is one of the worst parks in the world,' declares Adam Watson, a veteran ecological expert on the Cairngorms. 'It is a shameful insult to Scotland,
which will make us a laughing stock. We would be better off without it. The toytown politicians who dreamed it up have demonstrated their unfitness to govern us, and should be sent packing at the next election.' But this alleged 'stitch-up' on planning powers was only the half of it. For reasons that have never been fully explained, the Executive initially rejected
the park boundaries proposed by SNH in favour of an area half the size. In the face of fierce opposition, ministers then agreed to expand the area to include sections of the mountain range in Aberdeenshire and
Angus. But the area was still 25% smaller than that recommended by SNH, and left out a huge chunk of upland in north Perthshire. Predictably, this provoked outrage -- not just from outdoor recreation groups but from Perth and Kinross Council and from MSPs. As we report elsewhere in
this section, the council is now investigating taking the Executive to court for excluding an area that experts regard as an integral part of the Cairngorms. When the issue was debated at the rural development committee last Tuesday, a majority of nine to two were in favour of a motion regretting the exclusion
of Highland Perthshire, proposed by SNP MSP Fergus Ewing. But it was too late to amend the national park designation order and it was passed -- a decision that was endorsed by the whole parliament on Thursday. Dave Morris, director of Ramblers' Association Scotland, castigated Allan Wilson for refusing to yield to mounting pressure to redraw the boundaries. 'His
two great achievements -- uniting all other political parties and half the Labour Party against him and raising the practice of stubbornness to an artform -- will go down as a key event in the history of the
Cairngorms,' says Morris. Even SNH was taken aback by another reduction in the park's powers introduced at the last minute by the Executive. The conservation agency had assumed that
the Cairngorms National Park, like other national parks, would employ its own countryside rangers to protect wildlife and help visitors. But in fact the park board will not be required to run a ranger service:
landowners will run their own. This, argues Morris, will make it easier for gamekeepers to get away with illegally poisoning birds of prey . There are also fears that the Cairngorms park
could be deprived of resources . Budget allocations suggest that the Cairngorms could get only £2 million in its first year, less than half what Loch Lomond received. The Scottish Executive, however, insists that no decisions have been taken on funding. And it says that the Cairngorms park will still be free to employ
rangers ... if it wants to. 'At no time has Peter Peacock ever asked for the size of the Cairngorms National Park to be reduced,' added an Executive spokesman. Allan Wilson has also denied allegations that the shrunken boundaries or reduced planning powers will disable the park. 'Our priority was to establish an
effective and coherent national park, and that is what we believe we have done,' said a spokesman for the minister. But Wilson's words are not going to deter campaigners. They are already laying plans aimed at ensuring that the park's flaws, and the urgent need to
correct them, will be a constant source of irritation in the run-up to the Scottish elections next May. Even the mild-mannered Royal Society for the Protection of Birds hints of trouble to come. 'RSPB Scotland is
disappointed that the second national park in Scotland begins life with inadequate boundaries and powers,' says Lloyd Austin, the society's head of policy operations. 'However, we are pleased at the widespread
level of support for changing the boundaries and we hope this lays the foundations for an early review.' Characteristically, Dave Morris is less polite. 'The Scottish Executive faces a very rough ride in the months ahead. Sorting out the Cairngorms boundary
will be a focus for environmental campaigning throughout 2003,' he says. Such is the lack of support for cutting out Highland Perthshire that Morris is confident ministers will be forced to change their minds.
'It is obvious that the political argument will be won next year,' he predicts. Whether he is right, of course time alone can tell. But it seems certain that the storm clouds that have shrouded the Cairngorm mountains for most of the
last century are not about to clear. How the park came about 1889 Dunbar-born John Muir proposes a national park at Yosemite in the USA. 1928 Access campaigner Ernest Baker calls for such a park in the Cairngorms. 1931 The Addison committee suggests the Cairngorms as a national park. 1947 The Ramsay committee proposes that the Cairngorms and four other areas in Scotland become national parks. 1949 Scotland is excluded from legislation establishing national parks in England and Wales. 1953 The Cairngorms are made a national nature reserve. 1957 The 10th national park is established in England and Wales . 1975 The Countryside Commission for Scotland recommends the Cairngorms as one of three 'special parks'. 1981 Two national scenic areas are designated in the Cairngorms. 1991 A proposal for the Cairngorms to be one of four national parks is rejected by the Conservative government. 1992 The Cairngorms Working Party suggests a partnership instead of a park. 1995 The Cairngorms Partnership is set up to work out a management strategy . 1997 Labour announces plans to introduce national parks in Scotland. 1999 Scottish Natural Heritage calls for national parks in Loch Lomond and the Trossachs, and in the Cairngorms. 2000 The Scottish parliament passes the National Parks (Scotland) Act and plans for a Cairngorms park are published. 2002 Loch Lomond and the Trossachs becomes Scotland's first national park. 2003 The Cairngorms National Park will be established, with a smaller boundary and weakened planning powers. Ministers face Cairngorms lawsuit
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