Footpaths campaign gathers pace
This article recounts the work of The ‘Intrusive Footpaths Campaign’, representatives of whom will meet Defra officials in Somerset this week with the aim of negotiating relief for landowners who say they are tormented by walkers’ access to their land. Presenting cases involving paths slicing through cottage gardens, past sitting-room windows and through potentially hazardous working farmyards, the Campaign group is ‘fighting for the rights of people who have public footpaths running through their properties”.
At the same time, Ramblers is working with organisations including the RSPB and British Horse Society, National Farmers Union and Country Land and Business Association, and produced a list of recommendations to improve rights of way processes for inclusion in the draft Deregulation Bill, the Government’s drive to reduce red tape, and as part of its wider initiative ‘the great outdoors debate’s’.
What both campaigns bring to the fore is how interpretations of people’s enjoyment and use of the outdoors can be very different; as well as the need for a discussion about the (increasing) use and impact of our network of footpaths.
I really do wonder if there are links between the economic challenges facing parts of rural England as places for people to live and work and the level of access people can enjoy to the countryside? Do poor or resentful public access and poor economic performance align? Perhaps a detailed area of debate for another day???