Chairmans’s Overview
SCNP Chairman’s Report for the 32nd AGM held 21st April 2023
In one crucial respect, 2022 was for SCNP a radically different year from any other in the previous two decades. Instead of lobbying Ministers and politicians more generally for a change in policy, a key part of its role became one of monitoring, influencing and assisting in the implementation of a high-profile government commitment - to the establishment of at least one new National Park by May 2026. This changed context had far-reaching consequences for the nature of many of the organisation’s activities and lent a very different and overall more heartening flavour to its business.
Despite the continuing uncertainties created by the Covid 19 pandemic and by more localised problems such as rail disruption, the Executive Committee still managed to meet ten times during the course of the year. The first six of these meetings were held online but in the second half of the year the Committee moved to its planned cycle of alternate online and in person sessions. The AGM once again took place virtually, on 23rd April.
The organisation’s finances remained healthy and the Annual Report and Accounts for the previous year were duly and timeously submitted to OSCR.
One continuing challenge for the organisation lay in the realm of communications, where ongoings difficulties in maintaining and updating its website and making effective use of social media hampered its ability to relay information at a time when its expertise and activities should have been of wider pubic interest than ever before. In the absence of email addresses for many of its members, it was hard to keep up a regular flow of information even to them. Improving performance in this field remains a high priority for the coming year.
National Park Strategy for Scotland
SCNP continued to work in partnership with the Action to Protect Rural Scotland (APRS) to secure the designation of additional National Parks in Scotland. Following the inclusion in the Bute House Agreement between the Scottish National Party and the Scottish Green Party of a pledge to create and resource at least one new National Park during the 2021-26 Parliamentary term, the task became one of ensuring that this was honoured. SCNP was particularly concerned that both the process adopted for selection and designation and the form and functions of the Park, or preferably Parks, eventually established conformed to best international practice.
This new phase of the so-called “Joint Project” was clearly destined to run for at least four years, if not longer. It also appeared entirely possible that it would – at least periodically – require more time and effort than the project’s long-time Project Manager, John Mayhew, was likely to be able to devote to it. In these circumstances John suggested, and the Executive Committee agreed, that he should step back from his role but in a way that achieved as seamless as possible a transition to his successor. This was successfully accomplished through the appointment to the role of a colleague, Nikki Sinclair, who was already working with him on other APRS business and who had an in-depth knowledge of the Scottish environmental policy scene. SCNP is deeply grateful to both of them for the skill with which they effected the hand-over and to John himself for the outstanding contribution that he made in the more than a decade that he spent promoting the National Park cause. There can be no doubt that the eventual success of the campaign on which he worked so tirelessly is in large measure due to his commitment and to the effectiveness of his advocacy.
In the early months of the year, the primary aim was to seek to clarify the process and timescale envisaged for the designation of a new National Park. This involved not only approaching and liaising with relevant NatureScot and Scottish Government officials but also persuading sympathetic MSPs to table appropriate Parliamentary Questions. SCNP was agreeably surprised at how open all those concerned were to exchanging thoughts and ideas and to tapping the expertise that the organisation had acquired in Protected Landscape matters over the years. It was also clear that they valued the role that, equipped with this knowledge, SCNP could play in helping interested parties in potential candidate areas to consider their options and frame possible propositions.
As the route forward became clearer this contribution was recognised and formalised through SCNP’s membership of the National Park Stakeholder Advisory Group, convened and chaired by NatureScot. SCNP fed in thinking and advice both through this body and through responses, both formal and informal, to consultations carried out by the Scottish Government and by NatureScot. Particularly important in shaping the views communicated was a strategy workshop held in late July, to which representatives from both SCNP and APRS were invited.
A key element of the argument that SCNP made was that Scotland would benefit greatly from the designation of several more National Parks, not just one. This reflected the approach and case set out originally in the 2013 “Unfinished Business” report and advanced consistently since. It had the advantage not only of representing SCNP’s genuine assessment of the situation but also of enabling it to offer advice and help even-handedly to a range of candidate areas, from those with long-established local campaign groups – such as Galloway and the Scottish Borders – to ones where interest was tentative and initially confined to no more than one or two individuals. SCNP also emphasised its support in principle for the designation of National Parks spanning the terrestrial and marine environments and maintained the close working relationship previously established with the Blue Marine Foundation.
One of the liveliest debates in discussions about the future of National Parks in Scotland revolved around the degree to which they should have a new overarching purpose relating to the twin, related aims of nature recovery and combatting climate change – the latter being expressed in terms of a “just transition to net zero”. In particular the question arose as to how far they could and should be expected to contribute to the Scottish Government’s stated goal of protecting 30% of Scotland’s nature by 2030, as part of a wider international effort to meet this same target. Whilst there was widespread agreement that National Parks should play a central part in this endeavour, views differed as to how far this required radical change to the existing Scottish National Park model and in particular to the scale and character of areas appropriate for future designation, as well as to the management of both current and future Parks.
In contributing to these exchanges, and especially those taking place within the environmental NGO community, SCNP stressed the degree to which past experience worldwide had demonstrated the need to pay due regard to the needs and aspirations of local communities in the management of protected areas and the extent to which in a Scottish context and with a changing climate the task was likely to be at least as much about nature enhancement as protection. The magnitude of the landscape change that would often be involved made it all the more important to make achieving it a shared community endeavour and to have a suite of National Parks that demonstrated what nature recovery might mean, and how it could be brought about, across a wide range of different landscapes, habitats and land management regimes.
Existing National Parks
As in 2021, preoccupation with this broader policy agenda, and the process for designating at least one new National Park, restricted the attention that SCNP was able to give to issues arising within Scotland’s two existing National Parks. Indeed, much of the interaction with them involved exchanging views on the questions raised by the wider debate. From this perspective it was very helpful to be able to draw on the twenty years of experience now accumulated by staff in the National Park Authorities on matters ranging from functions and powers to governance arrangements. Despite this primary focus, SCNP did nonetheless manage to weigh in on several topics. These included the updated National Park Plan for the Cairngorms, which it strongly supported, and the A82 upgrading and revised West Riverside development proposals in Loch Lomond and the Trossachs, where its interventions were more critical in character.
Other protected landscapes: Regional Parks and National Scenic Areas
One incidental benefit of the debate and consultations about the future role of National Parks, and the location of any additional ones, was the opportunity that it provided to highlight the existence and potential of other landscape-based designations, such as Regional Parks and National Scenic Areas, and the neglect that these were currently suffering. Interestingly, several of the areas put forward as possible candidates for National Park designation in the online dialogue initiated by the Scottish Government arguably leant themselves much better to such treatment, especially as Regional Parks. Similarly, the National Stakeholder Advisory Group was a useful forum in which to point out the lamentable lack of active management in National Scenic Areas, as a result of which they had lost their recognition as IUCN Category V Protected Landscapes. In response there have been encouraging signals from NatureScot and the Scottish Government that these issues, although not to date explored in any depth in the Group itself, would be the subject of fuller consideration as the programme of work on National Parks unfolded further.
The wider environmental agenda: collaboration with other environmental bodies
SCNP remained an active member of Scottish Environment LINK, contributing in particular to the work of several of its topic groups, including those dealing with planning, land use and land reform and landscape. It also put its name to a number of LINK representations resulting from the work of these and other groups, including that setting out its views on achieving the 30x30 target. Similarly, SCNP participated as fully as its limited resources allowed in the activities of Scotland’s Landscape Alliance. Several Executive Committee members participated in the conference on Managing Continuity and Change in Scotland’s Landscapes that it held at the end of November.
Administrative support
After several years in which SCNP had failed to fill the offices of Honorary Secretary and Membership Secretary and struggled effectively to maintain its communications, including its website, the Executive Committee decided that the time had come to consider alternative options for meeting its administrative requirements. The increased activity arising from the Scottish Government-led programme of work described above reinforced its conviction that better arrangements were essential. After reviewing its financial position and prospects, the Committee decided that the best solution lay in buying in a modest amount of dedicated administrative support. Public advertisement and personal recommendations yielded between them a strong field of experienced candidates and following interviews and one initial aborted appointment, Pamela Paton took up the role in August. In the remaining months of the year her success in bringing greater order to the organisation’s affairs amply justified her appointment.
Finance
SCNP’s end-year bank balance was £12,300. Although a reduction of about £3,250 on the previous year’s figure, this was still a healthy sum, especially given the fact that the cost of the Project Manager for the National Parks Strategy project was now being borne directly by APRS, with the benefit of a grant from a private charitable trust. As explained above, the Executive Committee felt that in these circumstances expenditure of around £2,000 a year – and perhaps rather more in the early stages as the postholder got to grips with the role – was entirely affordable and likely to bring significant benefit to SCNP’s future operation.
Membership
In common with many charities, SCNP has in recent years been unable to translate heightened public interest in its field of activity into additional membership. This state of affairs has resulted in a gradual decline in the number of subscriptions, though the remaining core of members has proved very loyal and is greatly valued. The appointment of an administrator to manage membership matters and to assist in raising the organisation’s profile was seen by the Executive Committee as a key means of capitalising on current and prospective publicity around the Scottish Government’s National Park commitments to attract new members, together with their subscriptions and other forms of financial support.
Executive Committee
As noted earlier, the Executive Committee met regularly through the year, ten times in all. With the changes in personnel working on the National Parks Strategy project,
SCNP and APRS jointly decided to stand down the Steering Group previously set up to direct the project and to remit its oversight to the SCNP Executive Committee. The policy positions to be advocated will, however, remain the shared responsibility of the two organisations. This common ownership was reflected, for instance, at the Strategy Workshop held in July, which was attended by trustees from both bodies.
Risk Review
The main risks to SCNP’s future continued to arise from uncertainty over the long-term funding for its main project and the limited resources available from its relatively small membership base to support its core activities. Funding for the former is now secure until 2024 and as indicated above action was taken and is under way to try to convert increased public awareness of the National Parks agenda into active engagement with and support for SCNP.
Executive Responsibility for the Financial Statement
The Executive is required to prepare a financial statement for each financial period which reflects the financial affairs at the end of the period and the surplus or deficit arising within the period. In preparing those financial statements the Executive is required to:
Select suitable accounting policies and apply them consistently
Make judgements and estimates that are reasonable and prudent
Prepare the financial statements on the going concern basis unless it is inappropriate to presume that the charity will continue to operate.
The Executive is responsible for keeping proper accounting records which disclose, with reasonable accuracy at any time the financial position of the charity. It is also responsible for safeguarding the assets of the charity and hence for taking reasonable steps for the prevention and detection of fraud and other irregularities.
Approved by the Executive through online consultation and signed on their behalf and with authorisation by:
John Thomson - Chairman