Plenty of news today about forest sell-offs and lease-offs but here's an interesting twist. Some Natural England staff are coming together to offer to manage NNRs through creating a new company to do the management work. They may see their jobs at risk and this is a way of saving them. It's an interesting idea. But would it lead to any real savings in money for the taxpayer I wonder?
And 'Would forest sell-offs and lease-offs lead to savings?' is the question asked in the papers today too. As this blog said earlier in the week - it might not be all about money but it must be partly about money. We need to get good value for money from any disposal of our land (notice I say land not trees).
Will there be an FC staff offer to manage heritage forests similar to that from NE staff if the government presses on? And might there not be some value in combining these two bits of our land, with heritage value, in some way in the future?
A love of the natural world demonstrates that a person is a cultured inhabitant of planet Earth.
No need to be sorry Bob always respect your views.
Sooty, Sorry its me again. Those who use forests for leisure activity pay well for it. It draws in considerable income to the community. The suppliers of that leisure use forested areas and pay for it.
We must get away from regarding forests as reserve areas where I would totally agree about restrictions on losse dogs, noisy activities etc.
What is a forest. To some degree the trees are a distraction. Originally forests were hunting areas full of open space with noise, with deer, boar and wolves being hunted, horses ridden and entertainment being the name of the game. This has developed into leisure activity as we know it and yet, alongside that, biodiversity has flourished and continues to do so except where the the modernisation of forestry itself came along and we filled the spaces with monoculture trees.
The Cotswold Water park sightings website
My Flicker page
It is the same old story 1% who use forestry for recreation think the other 99% should fund their recreation activities.Come on do not have short arms in long pockets pay a relative small amount for your fun.All RSPB members do that same thing.
Mark, I strongly believe that the actions of the present government should be campaigned against and rejected, it is not just naturlists that benefit from the use of these ares. I do hate the fact that a goverment of any persuation can just put up for sale huge ares of forest that does after all belong to us the general public. it's Ok saying that other sectors will take over it's management but how can we be sure that this will still allow access to all uses and what is the safety factor that vast areas will become into private hands who will fence off areas and ban the public from its use. It's not as though the exchequer will gain vast ammounts of finace from it's sale, and against the value to us Joe public it would be a tragedy for it to happen. NO it should be campaigned against.
We should all join together to campaign against this sell-off, it's not a party political issue but one of common sence. The forest areas are already in the hands of the nation and it's people. It is not a politician's right to sell off vast areas of woodland that belong to us all. Is it fair that our forest is sold off, then we are asked to put our hand in our pockets to support the charities that will take over the management, good as thet may be. The saving to exchequer is minimal as compared to value to all of us who use this valuable asset. It's not just naturalist's who benefit but all hikers, campers, cyclists, dog walkers and many more. NO I feel strongly that we urge this government to re-think and retrack from these proposed actions.