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MARINE NATIONAL PARK

Kirsty Macleod

Ardlarach. Letterfinlay, Spean Bridge, Inverness-shire PH34 4DZ

Filed 02 Feb 06
©www.land-care.org.uk

Kirsty Macleod's letter published in the West Highland Press on 27th January 06
is reproduced here with notes added by the author

The Editor
West Highland Free Press

MARINE NATIONAL PARK

I have read with interest the three published responses defending the idea of a marine national park on the west coast and islands.

Scottish Natural Heritage’s West Highland Area Manager (13/1/06) would be well advised to stop spinning tales. A marine park would not be “run largely by local people”. This is a grotesque distortion of the truth which most people have now grasped. A national park is run within the parameters set by other people, namely quasi-scientists, urban-based single-interest pressure groups and governments with Unionist agendas (1).

I hope that Maxwell Macleod (20/1/06) will not be offended if I decline to be lectured by the Hebridean Whale and Dolphin Trust (HWDT) on the way forward for the rural economy (2). The HWDT has relied on volunteer labour and continuous hand-outs from bodies like SNH for years (3). Their ship was purchased with a grant from the Heritage Lottery Fund (HLF) and so generous was the amount given that the HWDT and the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds together gobbled up 50% of the entire HLF grant to the first Nadur scheme in the Argyll islands (4). Again, people have grasped that the job opportunities to which he refers are largely dependent on charitable status and a begging-bowl and are therefore not financially or politically sustainable in the long run.

The one point worth pursuing comes from ex-SNH deputy chairman, Michael Scott (13/1/06). He states that the idea for a marine national park came partly from “an off-the-cuff remark by the First Minister”. But there will be some background to politicians’ casual remarks and this is where we are missing the information on this issue to which we are entitled. In practice, with all the conservation, fishery, planning and access legislation that we now have, national parks, marine or otherwise, are an anachronism. So what lies behind the push for parks? Is it an obligation to fulfil yet another national or international agreement, perhaps on sustainable development? If so, what is this all about? When were we ever consulted on signing up to this obligation? Who or what is envisaged as being affected by such an obligation?

It is high time, therefore, for the Scottish Executive and groups like the Worldwide Fund for Nature (WWF), who have given key funding to help establish a self-styled “community” group lobbying for a Hebridean marine national park, to stop hiding behind talk of tourism opportunities and local control. In the case of the WWF, I have learned from correspondence with them that they are not even calling for a marine park in response to local members’ demands (5) : they are unable to tell me how many members they have in the proposed park area being put forward by the Hebridean Marine National Park Partnership, whose literature the WWF has funded (6). Has the WWF even consulted its own members in the area? If not, what exactly is going on?

I’m sure your readers, like me, would welcome the truth, straight answers and proper consultation from now on. These will not come by consulting with SNH.

Yours sincerely,

Mrs Kirsty Macleod.

NOTES TO THE TEXT

(1) The National Parks (Scotland) Act 2000 has created two parks in Loch Lomond & the Trossachs and the Cairngorms. In both cases, Park Boards are made up of 10 government appointees, 10 local authority councillors and 5 local residents directly elected to the Boards by local people. In theory, therefore, the 15 democratically elected Board members are in a majority and this is clearly what Scottish Natural Heritage (SNH) wants to emphasise. Even supposing, however, that no outside parameters existed (such as the over-riding obligation to protect the natural heritage), the fact that the appointment of the 10 local authority nominees must be approved by Scottish Executive Ministers can be viewed as potential interference in the democratic process.

(2) The Hebridean Whale and Dolphin Trust’s Mission Statement (in 2000) listed its aims as raising awareness, conducting research and “work(ing) within and support(ing) the local economy of the Hebrides through the promotion of sustainable eco-tourism and the truly sustainable use of the Hebridean marine environment”. Like so many other publicly-funded charities and development experts, the HWDT has yet to demonstrate how financial sustainability can be achieved.

(3) Grants by SNH and via SNH programmes to the Hebridean Whale and Dolphin Trust are as follows :

All figures are taken from SNH annual Facts and Figures.

In 1995 it was reported locally that “a cash crisis is threatening the future of a marine research trust on Mull”, i.e. the HWDT . According to the article “since work began in 1989 and the trust was officially set up last year, extensive research has been carried out into marine life off the west coast including a photo-ID programme on whales and dolphins”. Whilst this may be the case, it would be interesting to know whether any of this research is considered of sufficient value to be used in the wider field of conservation science. The SNH figures detailed above give no hint of this and there is no reference in any of SNH Facts & Figures to grants for Research to the HWDT. (Quotes Oban Times, 17/8/95).

(4) Figures released by the Nadair (sic) Trust in March 2001 confirm that the Heritage Lottery Fund granted £2m to support a series of heritage projects costed at £3m throughout the Argyll Islands; the shortfall was to be made up by contributions from other sources. The HWDT received £135,885 for “marine education and interpretation project”, £414,329 for a “Marine Outreach and Floating Classroom” (i.e. a ship) and £33,069 for “Community Sealife Sightings Programme”. The total sum of £583,283 represented a 79% grant on expected expenditure of £742,379 and comprised 30% of the entire HLF grant. (The grant to the RSPB totalled £410,432 or 20% of the entire HLF grant). It should be pointed out that whilst the original purpose of the ship was a “floating classroom” to take local school children to sea, this has been restricted to inviting the children aboard only when the ship is tied up at the various piers throughout the region. The ship has also, controversially, been used for commercial purposes and so has arguably eaten into the livelihoods of the existing marine eco-tourism operators.

(5) According to Nicky Golding of WWF (e-mail to K Macleod, 17th Oct 2005), WWF Scotland “believes that Marine National Parks have the potential to provide economic and social benefits for local communities alongside benefits for the environment” and this belief is based on “international experience”. On 20th October I asked how many WWF members lived within the boundaries of the proposed Hebridean Marine National Park Partnership park in Argyll and Lochaber. I was told that WWF-Scotland has 26,000 members in total but if I wanted to know the specific number living in the proposed park area, I would have to forward the postal codes contained within said area. I was not able to provide this information and on 6th December I again asked how many WWF members lived within the proposed marine park. There has been no reply to date.

I assume, therefore, that if WWF-Scotland is not able to state how many members it has within the proposed park area, then it has not consulted with its own members on this issue. Since Nicky Golding stated in an e-mail of 21st October that “WWF, together with our supporters, lobbied the Scottish Parliament to ensure that marine and coastal areas could be included in the National Parks enabling legislation”, it may be assumed also that WWF policy has been formed in advance of local consultation on this issue.

(6) WWF-Scotland confirmed (e-mail to K Macleod, 17th Oct 2005) that the Hebridean Marine National Park Partnership had submitted a proposal “to WWF asking for support for printing a leaflet”. This financial support was approved because the HMNPP proposal stated “Community involvement is paramount to the success of the Partnership. Therefore the first stage of implementation is to inform the local community and commercial sectors..” Inform the local community of what? That a marine park is coming whether they like it or not?

Strangely, WWF-Scotland, having confirmed that they had financially supported the HMNPP leaflet, nevertheless stated emphatically that “WWF-Scotland is not providing funding to the Hebridean Marine National Park Partnership, however we did fund a leaflet produced by the partnership promoting community consultation and to gauge stakeholder interest in the setting up of a Marine National Park” (e-mail from Claire Pescod to K Macleod, 1st Sept 2005). This insistence on putting distance between WWF-Scotland and the HMNPP was re-emphasised by Nicky Golding : “I would like to make it very clear that we are not ‘promoters’ of the Park…WWF is not proposing any specific area for designation..We believe that the impetus..must come from local communities themselves. This is why when approached by the Hebridean Marine National Park Partnership for funding to produce a leaflet in order to raise the idea and to undertake consultation with the local community we agreed to help them fund the leaflet” (e-mail to K Macleod, 21st Oct 2005).

The only thing to add is that the Hebridean Marine National Park Partnership has only ever once confirmed (at its AGM of Sept 2003) the level of public support it enjoys : 108 individuals or organisations responded to the WWF-funded leaflet in 2003 and, of that, 67 were broadly or conditionally supportive of a marine national park covering an area with an estimated population of up to 30,000 people. Subsequent attempts in the local public press to elicit any information on the number of supporters of this “community” organisation have failed.

©www.land-care.org.uk

Further reading recommended by Land-Care

Editorial (2003). Who runs Scottish Natural Heritage?
See SOCIAL/ECONOMIC/POLITICAL Homepage, filed 17 Oct 03, www.land-care.org.uk Click Here to View

Scottish Executive (2005). Scotland aims for first marine park. News Release 15th June 2005
http://www.scotland.gov.uk/News/Releases/2005/06/15123643