Last week's autumn budget statement has met with disappointment from a number of leading environmental groups but some money has been earmarked to help improve our rural tourism.

The statement given by the Chancellor, George Osborne sets out future measures to protect the economy and to rebalance growth. This year, its focus is on supporting the expansion of high carbon infrastructure (expansion of our road, rail and air networks / lack of investment in the clean energy sector) and includes plans to review the Habitats Directive – regulations which currently protect some of our most important wildlife.

The budget has been met with shock and dismay by many organisations such as the RSPB and the Wildlife Trusts, who see the Government’s plans as a quick economic fix, focussing on the development of new infrastructure to the long term detriment of our natural environment.

The Chancellor in his speech on 26th November said;

‘We are identifying over 500 infrastructure projects we want to see built over the next decade and beyond. Roads, railways, airport capacity, power stations, waste facilities, broadband networks. We are mobilising the finance needed to deliver them too. We are committing a further £5 billion to future projects in the next spending period, so the planning can start now’.

‘We shouldn’t price British business out of the world economy. If we burden them with endless social and environmental goals – however worthy in their own right – then not only will we not achieve those goals, but the businesses will fail, jobs will be lost, and our country will be poorer. And we will make sure that gold plating of EU rules on things like Habitats aren’t placing ridiculous costs on British businesses’.

The statement outlines the need for a review of the Habitats and Wild Birds Directives as currently implemented in England, focussing in particular on those obligations that affect the authorisation process for proposed development, with a view to reducing the burdens on businesses while maintaining the integrity of the purpose of the directives. The BMC will be responding to this consultation with colleagues from Wildlife and Countryside Link.

Better news from the budget statement however, comes from the announcement that;

• The Government will commit £25 million to promote rural tourism, including a new £10 million fund within the Regional Development Programme for England (RDPE) to develop rural tourism destinations.

On 29 November 2011, Government announced a strong package of new measures designed to stimulate sustainable growth in the rural economy and help rural businesses to reach their full potential. The Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) has published a Rural Economy Growth Review, which is a new £165 million package of support to help boost local and regional economies by creating jobs, and providing goods and services such as tourism.

The measures announced in the Rural Economy Growth Review are designed to address the key rural barriers identified in the Review and help rural businesses take advantage of the opportunities available to them. One of the key themes is Supporting Rural Economies. This includes the following measures;

• Visit England is investing £12m in promoting rural tourism nationally, with the aim of increasing tourist numbers and overall visitor expenditure;
   
• Defra is establishing a £10m fund from within the RDPE Rural Economy Grant Scheme to support local tourism initiatives, including projects to develop rural destinations and to strengthen rural tourism businesses;
   
• Defra will work with the 34 Areas of Outstanding Natural Beauty in England to help them develop a new approach to supporting sustainable tourism;
   
• Defra will provide up to £2m to enable local communities to enhance their tourism offer by improving public rights of way;
   
• Defra is providing up to £1m for a new sustainable rural tourism initiative in the North East of England, based on the Our Land approach being used across protected landscapes in the South East.

All of these measures come however, against a backdrop of funding cuts made earlier in the year, which have already had an impact on many of these areas of work. In particular local authority funding cuts have meant that rights of way budgets have been cut along with the teams needed for their upkeep. The Ramblers have called for a more consistent approach from Government ‘which shows that they understand the value and importance of our countryside heritage and where funds aren’t given with one hand and taken away with the other.’

The package of measures was announced as Mr Osborne said growth was likely to be only 0.7 per cent next year and the Government would need to borrow an extra £100bn over four years.
 

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