Departing Scottish Rural Affairs Cabinet Secretary Mairi Gougeon has been urged not to leave a “toxic legacy” of a divisive National Park in Galloway when she steps down at next year’s Holyrood elections.
Earlier this month, Ms Gougeon, 39, announced she would not be seeking re-election, but campaigners against the park fear she might try to rush legislation through the Scottish Parliament to meet the SNP’s promise to deliver a third National Park before the election.
The Natural Environment Bill, which sets out new conditions for National Park operations, was published a week after the consultation on a new park in Galloway closed, and as the analysis of consultation responses will take weeks for the Scottish Government’s NatureScot agency to evaluate, time is already running very short for new park legislation to be drafted, consulted upon, scrutinised and passed within the next 13 months.
Last week, Nature Scot asked for a two-week extension to the evaluation process, putting further pressure on the schedule.
Ms Gougeon has promised an initial decision will be made this summer, but legislation will then need to be drafted, and a further public consultation held before MSPs can examine its contents.
No Galloway National Park Campaign (NGNP) co-founder Liz Hitschmann has now written to Ms Gougeon to repeat calls for a halt. “We strongly feel it would be irresponsible for the Scottish Government to rush through such a drastic change to our way of life in the midst of the uncertainty of an election year, especially as this was never a SNP commitment in the first place,” she wrote.
“It is also clear to us that the terms of the Natural Environment Bill dictate how National Parks and other connected public authorities should operate, making a mockery of the claims that this would be a park made by the people and for the people of Galloway.”
Her campaign co-founder Denise Brownlee added, “Ms Gougeon’s departure will mean that if she approved a National Park in Galloway, it would be left to others to deal with the consequences.
“She is fully aware of the concerns many people have about the park, and if she ignored them and went ahead, it would leave a toxic legacy in our region which could do untold damage to our communities, but someone else would have to account for it. That would not be fair, and surely it would be common sense for any decision to be left to her successor.”
Leading NGNP campaign member Ann Purvis has also written to Ms Gougeon to point out the serious problems created by the changes proposed in the Natural Environment Bill, when the Galloway National Park consultation was based on the current system established under the National Parks (Scotland) Act 2000.
“In effect the Government were seeking views on the basis of the Act, at the same time as they were planning changes to it. These changes were not published until after the consultation closed,” she wrote.
“You appear to be expecting our community to accept that Government can, behind the scenes of a statutory consultation, change the legislative basis which sets out the ‘ground rules’ for the proposal under consideration.
“Whilst the powers and process for designation may not have changed, much of the substance of what the community were being asked to give their view on looks likely to. The timing of the publication of the Natural Environment Bill, less than a week after the consultation closed, demonstrates how little regard the Scottish Government have for the views that have been offered.”
You can read the letters to the Cabinet Secretary for Rural Affairs from NGNP co-founder, Liz Hitschmann, and Ann Purvis by clicking here.