Hansard

I welcome the debate, as others have done, and I hope that it heralds a new period of action on national parks.

The motion asks us to commend the two existing national parks, which I am happy to do. The Cairngorms national park is largely within my region, although it is extending beyond it at a rate, these days. The park authority is a young institution that is still maturing and has, no doubt, made errors along the way. However, it already has many successes to its name: it has progressed the work of the Cairngorms Partnership, of which I was fortunate to be a member at one point in my past; it has strengthened the identity of the Cairngorms as a cohesive area; it has helped to create greater coherence between institutions and landowners in the area; it has helped to lever funding into the area for investment; and it has improved the path network, interpretation and the tourism that is on offer. It is also a home for much more education through the John Muir award and the like, and the work that it has been doing to try to preserve the wildcat is very important.

I want to highlight the work that the national park is doing on housing and housing policies, and the ambitious target that it is setting for affordable housing. I vividly recall that when I was a member of the former Cairngorms working party, which preceded the Cairngorm Partnership in considering the future management of the area, of all the issues that were raised with us about the future of the Cairngorms, housing for local people was the overwhelming one. I will return to that in a moment.

The motion also urges us to welcome the strategy group that is being established. I am happy to do that in the context of Sarah Boyack's amendment, because a clearer purpose for the group is required. A briefing that I got from the Scottish Council for National Parks suggests that the group should have a bigger, stronger and longer-term role. The briefing makes many good points and I hope that the minister will consider them when she has the time. I heard what she said, but I do not agree that the group needs to be a short-life group.

I want to focus on matters that I hope the strategy group will look at and keep firmly in mind as it undertakes its task in the coming period. I do so from the perspective of the Highlands and Islands which, given the area's outstanding environmental quality, is likely over time to yield the most areas that are likely to be candidates for new national parks both on land and in the marine setting.

Given the social and economic history of the Highlands and Islands, which has experienced 200 years and more of decline, with only comparatively recent recovery—which has happened only in parts of the area—if there are to be more parks in that part of the world, the opportunity that they provide for social and economic development will be a key factor. National parks' conservation objectives must also widen economic opportunity, otherwise they are unlikely to be acceptable to people in the Highlands and Islands. That was true of the Cairngorms when the national park was mooted. It was not a universally popular concept, because people saw it as a limitation on economic opportunity. However, very few people today would go back from where they are now.

The point about economics was illustrated by recent interesting developments in Harris, where a referendum of local people came out in favour of a national park. That was motivated principally by people's desire to protect their island and to see new economic opportunities for the area. Without that key focus on social and economic opportunities, it is unlikely that national parks anywhere in the Highlands and Islands will get support.

Within national parks, there ought to be an income stream for local development and improvement of the sort that we see moving into the existing parks. We should certainly not impose national parks on people; we need to take people with us in that.

That takes me to the third main point that I want to make. We have to remember that they are national parks, so they must be of national importance, but that must never mean that we exclude local people from their management. Local people in those areas, wherever they happen to be, are perfectly capable of managing national assets in the national interest if we are clear about the objectives and if we back them with resources. Over time, that will probably involve not only local people, but local people in partnership with national interests. The existing parks provide an example of how that can be achieved.

Planning decisions are crucial in the mix. It has always struck me as being paradoxical—particularly as the Highlands cover a vast territory, of which much could be designated in the long term—that people who live in a beautiful area should enjoy fewer democratic rights than those who do not live there. That is a challenge. The Cairngorm planning arrangements sought to strike the right balance between local and national interests. I am sure that the arrangements are not perfect, but they reflect the tension that will continue wherever a national park is proposed in the Highlands and Islands. Each new national park needs to be tailored to local circumstances—no single prescription for a park exists.

The size of a national park presents an interesting dilemma in the Highlands and Islands. The Cairngorms national park is vast and growing, but its boundary follows no particular logic. If the park is entered from the Dava moor side, where a new sign is on a granite plinth—if that is the right way to describe it; it is much larger than a plinth—one wonders why on earth the boundary is there, because travelling there involves going through a fantastic area of moorland that has its own attractions. I hoped that stage 2 of reviewing the parks would give people in Dava the opportunity to make the case for their area being in the national park, but I am sorry that they were deprived of that opportunity. However, if I understood the minister, they will have that opportunity through the new strategy group. If that is so, I welcome it.

Equally, if we drive south down the Drumochter pass, the area on the left is in the national park, but the area on the right is not. No logic that relates to the environment or the environmental quality determines that boundary. However, the dilemma in the Highlands and Islands is about how far the boundary should be moved to the right, because the landscape is fantastic all the way to the coastline in Lochaber.

The dilemma in designating parks in the Highlands and Islands is about how big they should be. It is arguable that so much of the Highlands could be designated as to make the exercise impossible, because the resources would never be available to make that work locally. The ability to provide funding and the ability to make a difference are needed. Big issues are involved.

In the Cairngorms, communities are in the park. That was the subject of much debate. The exception is Laggan, which objected to being left out of the park. As soon as communities are brought into a park tensions arise, because that involves all the human interactions with housing, for example, that do not arise if the park's size is narrowed to a core conservation area. If parks are to have social and economic purposes—I think that they should—we must accept that communities might be brought within park boundaries. As soon as that happens, it means that the governing body's membership must involve local people and that planning and housing issues must be dealt with. It should surprise nobody in the Cairngorms that more planning applications for housing are being made there, because the communities there are part of the park. As I said, that is a crucial concern for those areas. That comes with how we designate parks.

Presiding Officer, you look comparatively relaxed, so I will move reasonably, but not totally briskly, to a conclusion. The strategy group has much to consider. Does the potential for more parks exist? Has Scotland reached its limit for parks? I do not think so. Will future parks be on land or in the marine environment? How do we prioritise? Is the strategy about conservation or achieving a balance throughout Scotland between Dumfriesshire and the Highlands and other parts, for example? Is it about economics? Should communities have a bidding process? What do we do about existing bids from communities? How will candidate sites be identified? A range of questions has to be answered.

I hope that the Government does not hide behind the strategy group: it must make clear its view. Does it want more national parks? If so, where? What are the Government's priorities? Are they related to conservation or to social and economic development? Will the Government encourage bids?

I could go on, but I see that you are waiting for me to wind up, Presiding Officer. I shall do so with politeness and thanks for your grace.