Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:

To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what steps his Department is taking to increase the (a) number and (b) size of (i) national parks and (ii) national park cities.

Natural England is the statutory authority responsible for designating National Parks and National Landscapes/Areas of Outstanding Natural Beauty (AONBs) in England.

Natural England have undertaken early exploratory work to consider possible approaches to the designation of a new National Park in England. They currently do not have a timeline for progressing this work which is subject to on-going discussions and are not considering any additional landscape designation cases at the current time.

Natural England is not responsible for National Park Cities. The National Park City Foundation (a registered charity) is the steward of the global movement supporting cities all around the world in their aspiration of becoming National Park Cities. The Foundation has provided guidance for prospective National Park Cities including how to register local campaigns and submit applications. The Foundation states that they are on course for at least twenty five global National Park Cities by 2025.