Wild Land News no 62, Winter 2004/2005

COMMENT - A Landscape Forum? Article

You might think that a country which markets its scenery to the paying customers for all its worth (which is a lot, as a slice of the economy) would have put Landscape on some official pedestal. Yet for years it has been pretty much a dirty word in government circles, something that gets in the way of progress, something that costs rather than benefits. Indeed ministers have been heard to say that landscape is only a vote-winner for the Tories.

Scottish Natural Heritage has played down the landscape issue, partly because its own merged roots lay in scientific nature conservation with a lacing of countryside recreation, and mainly because every time it peeped over the landscape parapet it got its head blasted. SNH submitted an important paper on National Scenic Areas - to give them some teeth - back in 1999, and is still awaiting a response from a disdainful Executive. Last year, SNH put out a Landscape consultation, which said most of the right things, but pretty cautiously; it scarcely mentioned the economic value of scenery, let alone the notion that money might usefully be invested in restoring damaged or declining landscapes.

We have been active in responding to such exercises, attending discussions, and pushing a more upbeat line. So it is encouraging to hear SNH suggesting that they have hopes for a Landscape Forum. This would be drawn from groups with interests in the landscape, and would have some formal status and remit. Ideally, it would be convened by the Executive, alongside Forums it has created for other priorities such as renewable energy, but it may be down to SNH to organise.

We have welcomed such a move providing it is not just a talking shop, a way of kicking an irritating ball into the long grass. It could for example follow the model of the Access Forum, and be tasked with spelling out the scope of legislation to give landscape some formal recognition. This might codify what the various protective designations actually mean. More importantly it could create a duty of care for the landscape which all public agencies must exercise. Who knows, it could commission research on the value of landscape - and campaign for a Landscape Restoration and Improvement Fund charged with actively managing our scenic assets as though they were historic buildings or prime farm and forest.

LINK Landscape Task Force

Perhaps sensing that the L word is coming in from the cold, Scottish Environment LINK is creating a new Landscape Task Force. This replaces the Special Areas TF, which did much good work on the National Parks legislation, and the Recreation TF, ditto on the Access legislation. We hope to play a leading role in this Task Force, to be chaired by Bill Wright (ex-Cairngorms Campaign, now Rural Scotland).

LINK may be a mysterious creature to most readers; believe us it becomes even more mysterious on the inside. As a lobbying umbrella for over 30 organisations spanning archaeology to bat conservation, it does not push a high profile for itself (with a handful of paid staff in Perth), and it has to embrace interests which naturally will become almost diametrically opposed at times. What is inspiring is the commitment to try and resolve these conflicting priorities - global warming and windfarms, to name but one - within the camp.

We have already drafted a remit and manifesto for the Landscape TF, which has been put round likely members such as Ramblers, National Trust, MCofS. This is on our website (along with other key documents we get from LINK and elsewhere): if you think it falls short, say so. We will publish the final (but never Final) version in WLN.

LINK can be pretty influential - we attended a meeting with two Ministers to express concern over Climate Change, including threats to precious landscapes. We demanded a clearer Executive policy on the location of renewable energy installations, and believe some progress may ensue. SWLG may be a minnow amongst the large-membership organisations on LINK, but we have a voice and you can help script what it says.

Wolves at the fence

We have been waiting with bated breath (especially in dark and silent hours while bivvying in remote places) for someone to get fed up with the bureaucracy that surrounds species reintroductions, smuggle some wolves into the country, and release them in some unpopulated glen.

Now the press tells us that that glen might be Alladale, a magnificent and well-hidden corner of the Beinn Dearg massif in back of Bonar Bridge. Beyond Croick Church, it is visited only by the odd Corbett-bagger (Carn Ban, 845m) and the even odder pursuer of rockslides. As a thinly-wooded trough biting deep into a vast undulating plateau, it actually rather resembles Scandinavian wolf country.

Were the wolves simply to be released here and left to fend for themselves, that would be very interesting. It might reduce the number of Corbett completers, indirectly of course (we are assured that wolves only predate on the laggards who would never have completed them anyway). But we gather that Alladale is to be fenced in (shades of Glenbogle). This is of course entirely unacceptable, on many fronts. Paying for entry to a whole glen cuts across the open access principle. A perimeter security fence would be intolerable, especially if it followed the estate boundary around the valley rim. And the whole point of reintroducing a once-native species is that it too has the freedom to roam - anything less is a mockery.