I had thought that I would be on the BBC Radio 4 Today programme this morning - but experience shows that you can't count a Today Prog interview until it's broadcast. The democratic future of the people of Egypt really is more important than whether we get a Forest and Wildlife Service which can deliver a better future for our forests. But I will come back to that idea on Monday. And just in passing, I wonder what Mubarak would have thought of the Public Bodies Bill?
Yesterday there was quite a lot of pick up on yesterday's blog about the fact that we don't think that charities would find it easy to pick up management of the New Forest - and that the RSPB isn't volunteering to do it.. This blog was picked up by the Daily Mirror, Daily Express, Daily Star, BBC online and a large number of regional newspapers.
And yesterday's announcement on a delay to forest sales is in the Guardian, BBC online, the Mirror and elsewhere.
A love of the natural world demonstrates that a person is a cultured inhabitant of planet Earth.
Hi Mark,
In the Guardian yesterday you were saying essentially re Sell Off if I paraphrase "no prob with private forestry" and "right woods" "require certain safeguards etc etc" but as I have posted before by what environmental criteria are you acceding to the upland sales particularly in National Parks if FC stewardship is better than private forestry? I would not have thought you can accede to such a policy with regard to RSPB constitution and status.
Again I quote "Of the 256,797 hectares of Forestry Commission land in England, 85,795 hectares fall within National Park boundaries, with large areas in the New Forest, North York Moors, Northumberland, Lake District and South Downs National Parks".
Hands Off Our Forests and No Sell Off in our key uplands sites either (not all of which are in National Parks).
Peter Plover