So, how do you make the Lake District 'change and diversify' because it is too heavily weighted toward 'white middle-class able-bodied people'?

[Nanny0gg]

Richard Leafe, the Cumbria park's chief executive, said the Unesco World Heritage site must change to merit continued public funding.

I mean, it's mountains and lakes. What can you do?

And isn't that a tad patronising as well?

Is it only me who wonders if it's a prelude to selling off the national parks....because they are failing to represent the uk as a whole?

Isn't there a wider issue here that UK BAME are less likely to be seen anywhere at any holiday or leisure destination as they are much more likely to be less well off?

No.

I don't come from a 'less well off' family. & even if I did, Lake District isn't that expensive depending upon when you go.

I've been to Lake District twice, loved it but its a pita travelling there from London so I've not been back. Also a lot of us travel back to our heritage countries in holiday season to see family etc & get some sun, so we're unlikely to be here flocking to tourist attractions.

This Leafe guy is being silly and illogical. There are less of us at Lake District because this is England hence there are far, far more white than BAME in this country.

There are white British people living in my heritage country but I wouldn't expect to see 100s of them at attractions because there are far more of us than them.

We make up a small part of the population in the UK and I'm surprised Leafe's comments are even being taken seriously tbh.

He sounds the typical type striving to be oh so woke, getting it wrong, and very likely come to his own lofty conclusion without discussing the 'issue' with non-White people.

www.ethnicity-facts-figures.service.gov.uk/uk-population-by-ethnicity/demographics/people-living-in-deprived-neighbourhoods/latest

British Indians are the exception, yes. But the argument remains that if people are less well off, they won't be going on short breaks to the Lake District.

As I posted above, British South Asians (I suspect from North/NW cities) already holiday in the Lakes. The family and town attractions are popular. Remote villages and fells are not. May be partly due to who already goes there - we go with our BAME daughter and she is obviously different in many places, not in others.

Cheap package holidays to the lakes?

We make up a small part of the population in the UK and I'm surprised Leafe's comments are even being taken seriously tbh

I thought it was 14%. Not that much of a small part really. And there are areas like Leeds, Manchester and Bradford which have a reasonably diverse population and aren't too far from the Lakes or North York Moors. Yet only 1% of the visitors are from a BAME background.

I am sure there are many reasons why people don't visit such areas even though they live close to them, Some of them may be for reasons of just not interested, but there may well be other reasons that put people off or make such a lovely place unaccessible.

I was very surprised to see that it takes 5 1/2 hours to get to the Lakes from Leeds by bus. It's only 65 miles away. Better public transport would help people enjoy this beautiful landscape.

It is also expensive. Hostels can be expensive as are hotels. And not everyone likes camping for some reason I don't know how you can make such a place less expensive. As has been pointed out, London is expensive to visit and is a long way away.

But there are large population centres not too far from the Lakes - but maybe it is only reasonably accessible to people who can afford to run a car to get there and who can afford to stay there.

But the argument remains that if people are less well off, they won't be going on short breaks to the Lake District

That relates to anybody, not just BAME. I won't go back to Lake District as it takes ages to get there, may as well go abroad. Or somewhere pretty in Kent, which is what I do when I'm here as travel links are good and it's not so far away.

People go where they want to go I can't see that BAME would necessarily find Lake District so interesting that they'd return. & There are other places in the UK.

I'm going from anecdotal conversations (so don't want to be accused of racism), but a lot of people that originally come from hotter countries, don't want to go somewhere on holiday that won't be hot and will be colder than where they are now (I live in London and they've no interest in going up north).

I'm white and middle class though and I feel the same, I don't want to go somewhere where there is more chance of rain and bad weather. I've been to the lakes once for a wedding and thought it was OK but certainly not stunning, pretty overrated.

I love the Lake District but am surprised it is so popular. It only used to take us 1.5 hours to get there from Manchester, so it was convenient for us when I was a kid. But I'm surprised that people come from so far and wide and in such great numbers to get there.

That makes so sense - you love it but are surprised that it's popular?

I love lots of places - Kent and Norfolk for example, neither have people tramping all over them in such great numbers as Cumbria. I'm not surprised that it's popular at all, I'm surprised that it has become so massively popular outstripping almost anywhere else in the UK, given that for a lot of people it's not that easy to get to.

But really, must everywhere be “diversified” to the point where it’s all the bloody same? Why can’t the Lakes just be what they are? I happen to think that what they are is wonderful. Anyone who disagrees is under no obligation to go there

So only able bodied people should be able to enjoy the Lakes?? So people with disabilites/older less active people shouldn't have the same entitlement to the countryside or rural communities? I'm guessing you're also missing the point that disabled/older people actually live there as well.

It is bloody insulting to both those who live I The Lakes and to BAME-as if any group needed help to go on holiday in the UK.

Yes, I think a PP is right-it probably is a prelude to selling off the National Parks because they are not diverse enough. What bollocks Leafe speaks and I hope he gets the sack sometime soon-although we will probably see flying pigs above the tarns before we see that!

Odious little troublemaking shit.

Sometimes, some things are just not possible for everyone. I'm fat-not disabled- and I can't climb in the Lakes-should a stair lift be carved into the side of the hills or flatten them so I don't feel left out.?

It's this everyone must be able to do everything-prizes for all mentality-sometimes it is just not possible.
That's life.

So people with disabilites/older less active people shouldn't have the same entitlement to the countryside or rural communities?

We are dealing with natural features here, there is already massive erosion and loss of habitat due to visitor numbers. You can't just run a ramp up Scafell Pike so someone in a wheelchair can get there. It would probably be better if a lot fewer people were climbing about all over the place.

Try Sheringham on the 1940s weekend; the trains had to stop running this summer that weekend there were too many tourists trying to travel! And as for Carnival week in Cromer...

We got a nice cottage in August in the Lakes, £750/week, back in 2015, I think. I know it's not £150 for a week in a caravan in Gorleston, but I don't agree £800 for 4 beds is 'prohibitive' either. I was delighted at how cheap the whole hol turned out to be. Got up 3 peaks, including one where we met a group of elderly ramblers. Some of them were quite slow, they mentioned they couldn't walk far any more, certainly not all the way to the peak, most had walking sticks they leant on. But even they got up the lower slopes of Black Combe and were having a great social outing.

It looked like a disable access mountain to me that day.

But the argument remains that if people are less well off, they won't be going on short breaks to the Lake District.

They won’t be going on long breaks to the Cayman Islands either. Honestly, so what??

Not being able to read a map
Plus hillwalking is expensive; boots, fleeces, waterproofs and the rest.
I used to work on Snowdon and none of these issues ever stopped anyone. Plenty of idiots went up in inappropriate footwear with no map, that's why Llanberis Mountain Rescue are the busiest team in England and Wales.

Nobody's still told me how they intend to increase the diversity of the Bahamas and yacht-owning so I can enjoy it, I've noticed.

I feel alienated and disadvantaged. Ba ha. Richard Leafe? Got any ideas?

So much Little England mentality in this thread I despair. Do people really not understand about privilege?

As for this: So do people who are non-white want to go to the lakes? Do they want to not camp and instead stay in a hotel/B&B?
Can they afford it? I'd be considered very comfortable financially, don't live too far away and still bork at the cost of some hotels. It IS expensive.

What does it even mean? As a financially comfortable non-white camper sometimes I go to the Lakes and sometimes I don't, the lack of diversity is very obvious and I have no doubt self-perpetuating. And the word is baulk.

But the Bahamas and yacht-owning are not national parks. His point was that if the National Park wants continued funding, it will likely need to do a bit more to attract a more diverse range of visitors.

It is odd that this is causing so much drama and consternation and that people are getting themselves into such a lather about scenarios entirely of their own invention, like building escalators up Scafell Pike and the white population being driven from their homes.

I don't think people are getting themselves into a lather at all, but thinking that the comments in the article are rather daft and missing the mark.

His point was that if the National Park wants continued funding, it will likely need to do a bit more to attract a more diverse range of visitors

And I would argue that funding should be provided for environmental projects to rectify the damage done by visitors. They don't need any funding to attract more visitors, of any kind.

Also, why the focus on the Lake District? There are 17 national parks in the UK. Are the Trossachs or the Brecon Beacons known for their ethnic diversity?

Most areas of the UK are very white apart from around a few major cities.

why the focus on the Lake District?

Because that’s the park he’s Chief Exec of.