The Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (DEFRA) today announced that funding for our National Parks will be slashed by 21.5% over the next four years.

The campaigning charity the Campaign for National Parks (CNP) has reacted with dismay to today’s announcement by DEFRA that the English National Park Authorities will receive a 21.5% cash reduction over the next four years, which, when considering inflation amounts to a 28.5% reduction. They have said that ‘today’s announcement will have a long-lasting and detrimental effect on the excellent work that these bodies do to look after National Parks for the nation’.
The Park Authorities must make 5.4% cuts in 2011-12, but the figures provided for the three years from 2012-2014 are only indicative and will not be confirmed for some time.

Helen Jackson, CNP’s Chief Executive, today said ‘National Park Authorities are important rural employers and without a doubt funding cuts on this scale will lead to job losses and a reduction in services. They play a vital role in supporting local communities and this work, alongside their conservation responsibilities, means that they are powerful advocates for sustainable development. We are worried that some of the difficult choices that Park Authorities will now be faced with to make ends meet will affect their role in championing sustainability and result in less activity on key work such as education, outreach and raising public awareness about key environmental challenges such as climate change’.

In common with other Park Authorities, the Peak District National Park today released a statement outlining where it would be making savings and have produced an action plan to save more than £446,000 in 2011-12 whilst trying to protect essential services. DEFRA has confirmed that its grant for the Peak District National Park will be cut from £8.2m in 2010-11 to £6.5m by 2014-15, and that the grant for the Yorkshire Dales National Park in 2011-12 will fall to £5.1 million from its current level of £5.4 million, while by 2014, it will have fallen further to just £4.2 million.

The news today comes as no great surprise following the Government spending Review but numerous jobs will be lost and more changes may follow in the coming months. DEFRA’s draft Structural Reform Plan published on 16 July delivers the coalition agreement commitment ‘to review the governance arrangements of National Parks in order to increase local accountability’. They are currently consulting on the Governance arrangements for the National Parks and the Broads to which the BMC will be submitting a full and detailed response.

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