Coastal Access in England

Lord Greaves Excerpts

Thursday 12th July 2012 Lords Chamber

Tabled by

[Lord Greaves]

To ask Her Majesty’s Government what progress they are making on coastal access in England.

[Lord Greaves]

My Lords, I am not sure whether I am an ageing member of the Angry Brigade but, unfortunately, in about a fortnight’s time I will pass the average age of Members of this House. That must be a step too far, I think. I am probably not at the median yet.

I remind the House of my interests in the Open Spaces Society and the British Mountaineering Council. I thank the small group of noble Lords who have agreed to come to take part in the debate; the end of a Thursday afternoon is never the best time to get a full House. I particularly thank the noble Lord, Lord Hunt of King’s Heath, who has come in at the last minute as a “gap man”, for which I am very grateful.

The proposals for coastal access in England are derived from Part 9 of the Marine and Coastal Access Act 2009, which some of us have fond memories of dealing with at some length in this House. It is unexpectedly timely that I am asking this Question today—although I tabled it some time ago—because the first stretch of the coastal path was opened for access on 29 June in the Weymouth area of Dorset. I will not say any more about that; the noble Lord, Lord Knight of Weymouth, may fill us in on some local details. It is very nice to see him here this afternoon.

The press release issued by Natural England referred to,

“the first stretch of the new national Coast Path around the entire English coast”.

That is a matter for rejoicing for those of us who have championed this scheme from the start. It was very nice indeed to see the Minister, Richard Benyon, being so effusive in his congratulatory comments on it, and I congratulate the coalition Government on continuing to promote and carry out the work on coastal access in England. Indeed, Section 296 places a duty on both Natural England and the Secretary of State to do that. Five further projects under way at the moment were initiated under the previous Government but are being continued by the present Government, and we can look forward to Cumbria and Durham probably being the next two to be rolled out, as they say, and to the five that are under way being completed by the end of 2025. Concern was expressed in a lot of quarters that the new Government would drag their feet on this, and I congratulate them on the fact that they are keeping going—right on to the end of the road, one hopes, or at least to the end of the coastal path.

My first question is: what is now the target for completion around England? Originally, it was going to be done in 10 years, although I must say that I always thought that that was ambitious due to the complexity of the scheme. It would be interesting if the Government could give us a target. Wales has completed a path—but it is only one path, and I feel that a lot of people in Wales feel that Wales will have to go back to revisit the whole question of coastal access, as opposed to a path around the coast, and particularly access to the foreshore.

Natural England issued a very welcome proposal in May this year, which was headed England Coast Path Programme Vision—I was not sure about that as a nominal clause, but never mind—Next Stretches and Future Direction. There is a very interesting map on the Natural England website, setting out proposals for another five stretches of coast to be started very soon and then some longer-term ones to be started by 2017. Again, that is very welcome, and the areas that they are choosing are very sensible ones. They are the ones that will be most in demand and where there is most need for the path. That is all very encouraging.

My second question is whether the programme vision of Natural England has the full-hearted support of the Government. The work is directed by the coastal access scheme, which was published in March 2010. Under Section 299 of the Act, the first review has to be completed within three years, and that is due to take place this September. Will the Government confirm that the review will be used to improve and clarify the scheme and not to scale back the proposals? I hope that that is an easy question for them to answer.

After the work on the Dorset stretch, Defra carried out a limited “lessons learnt” exercise, which was a sensible thing to do. The main result is a change in guidance on the so-called spreading room—the access land on the landward side of the path. The whole scheme is based on the designation of new access land under amended provisions of Part 1 of the CROW Act 2000. The path itself is access land, as is the land between the path and the sea, apart from some excepted land, and some land on the landward side of the path where sensible, due to the nature of the land or a sensible boundary.

On the effects of the changes, which involve a more restricted view to declaring the access land the spreading land on the landward side, the Government’s communication to Natural England states:

“The general approach should be that the interests of the public in having access to such landward spreading room are likely to outweigh the interests of the landowner only in exceptional circumstances”—

important words—

“or where in the absence of any more restrictive clear and natural boundaries of the spreading room it is justified by strong convenience in establishing a clear and natural boundary”.

That is a different system from the one that we have had so far; it is not clear what difference it is going to make in practice, in a lot of places, but there are some particular concerns that it will not be used to undermine the status of any existing access land under Section 1 of the CROW Act, which adjoins the path on the landward side; that it will not result in new barriers, such as fences, along the landward side of the path where they do not exist at the moment, so resulting in a deterioration of the local amenity; and that access to crags used for climbing which are on the landward side of the path should not be restricted.

In other words, if there are clear crags used for recreational climbing, they should not be blocked off and that should be regarded as being a matter of convenience. A crag is often a natural boundary, which can sensibly be used, particularly if the boundary is at the top of the crag so that the cliff face itself is within the access. The British Mountaineering Council has produced a list of more than 50 such crags. Will the Minister confirm that serious consideration will be given to such evidence from climbers when making decisions on exceptional circumstances and strong convenience in establishing a clear and natural boundary?

I ask the Minister briefly about the Isle of Wight. Under Section 300 of the Act, the Secretary of State has the ability to specify that an island should be part of the coastal access provision. The Minister will remember that we discussed the Isle of Wight at some length when we were going through the Marine and Coastal Access Act. When will the consultation due on the Isle of Wight start? Do the Government agree with the statement in the frequently asked questions on Natural England’s website that,

“the Isle of Wight is expected to be included”,

or are they completely neutral about it?

My final question is about the recent year-long review of the management of national trails and the recent consultation by Natural England on the review. National trails—I am not talking about coastal trails now, I am talking about all the rest, such as the Pennine Way and the Cleveland Way—consist of 2,500 miles of walking with lots of opportunities for horse-riding and cycling in many places. The review of national trails raises a lot of questions which are not directly relevant to the question of coastal access, but how will the English coastal path be integrated into the plans for national trails, given that the English coastal path will, when complete, double the total length of England’s national trails—a mind-boggling statistic in itself. How will the coastal path be integrated into future systems for management of national trails generally?

I should be grateful to hear the Minister’s answers to these questions. I am sure he will have them all at his fingertips. I repeat that, taken as a whole, this is not a critical Question. I am delighted, as are a lot of people in the country, by the way in which the new Government have come round to support for this extremely important and exciting project.