For sale: Our lovely forests

[grannieonabike]

Can anyone explain this? I think I heard on the radio that the Forestry Commission is going to sell off the Forest of Dean.

(Also heard that the people of Dover are going to buy the Port, but that was better than Calais buying it!?)

Here's the link: www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-11653679

If they are selling it then I hope the right people buy it and manage it properly.

I'm sure it won't just be a free for all and let it all get built on .

But although they say the public will still have access, they don't say it will be free access. Imagine having to pay to go to a forest.

What about the Right to Roam? Would that be affected, I wonder? Haven't they recently made it possible to walk right along the coast even if that means going through private land? Maybe they would do the same with the forests. Hope so.

Ports are commerical operations. Medway Ports, for example, owns Sheerness and Chatham Docks and is part of the Peel Ports which owns, among other things, the Manchester Ship Canal. Selling off Dover Port as a commercial venture is not like selling off the white cliffs (as the Vera Lynn endorsement presumably wants us to think).

Forest of Dean is run as a commercial timber producing operation by the Forestry Commission. Not heard that it's for sale but would assume that if it is, as a designated 'National Forest Park' it would have to stay as such.

Would that mean free access would be protected?

I'm sure that even if they are sold off they will allow free access and put extremely tight planning restrictions on them.

My understanding is that the government will say that they will protect free access, but that in practice it will not be possible to police whether or not the new landowners actually allow people to use the forests.

I have also heard that selling the forests will not actually save money anyway, as the new landowners can apply for woodland grant funding at the taxpayers expense.

There is a petition here: www.38degrees.org.uk/page/s/save-our-forests

Why should you have 'free' access to private land?

There are some pretty ancient rights of way across private land. It's not quite the same as 'free access' - random wandering about can damage crops etc. - but footpaths and bridleways and various other waymarked routes are usually kept clear for walkers and other visitors to the countryside. When it comes to commercial timber production landowners will occasionally reroute a footpath around an area they're about to fell or replant.

Thank you for the link, Isthreetoomany. It's much worse than I thought: 'The government wants to sell off more than half of our national forests to private firms. This could mean ancient woodlands are chopped down and ruined. Wildlife would have to make way for Centre Parcs style holiday villages, golf courses and commercial logging'.

How can that be right? And the government will be giving them a grant to do this? Why?

Although they've got better nowadays about not just planting conifers in straight rows, if its Forestry commission land we're talking about not much of it is 'lovely forest'.

Parts of the Forest of Dean are nice but quite a lot is dank conifers. I'm not sure much of it is 'ancient woodland'.

I'd be horrified if they were flogging the coombes of Exmoor, for example - but those are probably privately owned anyway, and covered in public footpaths.

There'll be more conifers if the forests are sold, because aren't they still tax-free?

It might even be a good thing. A lot of forestry commission land is frankly a blot on the landscape, non-native trees with nothing living underneath. I don't see how private owners could do much worse, TBH. If any ancient woodland has escaped their timber production, it'd be better off in the hands of e.g. the National Trust - they own a lot of our real 'lovely forest'.

The National Trust wouldn't be as bad as CentreParcs ...

Private owners could and would do a lot worse if they build holiday villages all over the place.

Woodland has to be managed, but it's nice to have some wild places to hide in from time to time. I think there is more protection for the ordinary person who wants to go for a walk in the woods from the Forestry Commission.

I know about the non-native trees and the conifers. Even so, you's expect the people who planted these to be experts, yet they still made mistakes. What 'mistakes' will companies fired by the profit notive make?

You're forgetting planning permission... No-one can 'build holiday villages all over the place' in a National Forest or Park. Places like the Lake District or the Forest of Dean are not preserved in aspic - they have to provide income for local communities. That's always been the beauty of the system... we don't just throw a fence around them, put up the 'keep out' signs and leave it to the squirrels. They are working, living, breathing, maintained landscapes with farms, timber production, tourism and other businesses.

The forestry commission made what we can see now were mistakes - their original remit was, I suppose to be a nationalised timber industry, not a conservation and leisure organisation. That was their 'expertise'. I don't think private owners would be allowed to perpetuate that.

Woodland that remained in private hands or the NT tended not to be intensively farmed in this way. Quite a lot of it is in National parks, AONBs etc and is well protected, with lots of public access, rights of way often supplemented by permissive paths.

I love walking in woodland, and while the Forest of Dean is OK in places, it really isn't a patch on lots of non-FC woodland.

Aside from the woodland itself, there are a couple of excellent forestry commission sites near me that are great places for 'days out'. Alice Holt in Surrey has a Go Ape course and lots of play equipment, play trails etc. - for children of all different ages. There is also a newer site at West Wood in Wickham. The play equipment seems to be something the forestry commission have focused on much more in recent years.

I wonder what will happen to those, whether they will be preserved/maintained/expanded on? And also whether they will continue to be free to access? The government has already withdrawn the PlayBuilder funding for local authorities to build playgrounds, so there may end up being very little in the way of free-of-charge outdoor play places for children. And we keep hearing how children are becoming more obese...

Yes, I think the Go Ape places are wonderful, and the mountain bike tracks, nature trails etc. There's room for everything at the moment - and I would like to keep it that way!

Why do they 'have to provide income for local communities', Chil? Not everything has to bring in money. Some things can just be, can't they? Clearly you'd make more money if you put up a holiday lodge in the middle of the forest, but by doing that, you need roads, electricity lines etc and you spoil the solitude and the access for countless people who want to enjoy the woods.

In any case, I would rather any profits from timber etc went to the local councils for them to spend on schools and hospitals, not into the pockets of individuals.

It'll be back to the good old days of King John, when you could be hanged for killing the king's deer ... or the Enclosures when all the common land was stolen from the people who had used it for centuries. I'm almost old enough to remember that.

Seriously, though?

I think it's a terrible idea. I was looking at going to a FC cabin in place of a Center Parc "experience" and was thinking how can I afford it or is it worth it. I doubt it would be cheaper or in better taste if run completely privately.

I like the Alice Holt place too. I don't think a small charge would deter too many people, it's not a local place, you pay a lot in petrol anyway. It's whether it would exist at all in the future.

Any plans on selling off the air we breathe? I bet you they're working on it.

We do that already in Scotland. We bottle it and sell it to the tourists.

I would think 'Go Ape' type activities are exactly the sort of development a private owner would go for. You already have to pay for those, and for car parking at large FC amenity sites, not to mention expensive bike hire if you've not brought your own. Not sure much would change - rights of way remain rights of way.

"Why do they 'have to provide income for local communities',"

I think you have a touchingly naive view of what 'the countryside' is for if you think it should just sit there doing nothing while we trip through it with our rucksacks picking daisies. Landscapes may look empty and unmanaged but someone is out there fixing the dry-stone walls, tending to woodland, clearing ditches or rearing pheasants for the shoot - to make a living. We live on a small island. True wilderness is scarce because it's unproductive.

trots off to look in Private Eye to see who the government advisers were on this debacle

Undeniable, Chil - and I'm very grateful to the farmers for doing that and for making such a good job of it. (Not sure about the poor pheasants though!)

What worries me is over-exploitation of the countryside + profits that should be ploughed back into the local economy taken from land that should belong to us all going into private hands.

Here's a link to a petition to save the forests: www.38degrees.org.uk/save-our-forests

Hope that works. This is what they say:

The government wants to sell off more than half of our national forests to private firms. This could mean ancient woodlands are chopped down and ruined. Wildlife would have to make way for Centre Parcs style holiday villages, golf courses and commercial logging.

We need to stop these plans. Ancient forests like The Forest of Dean and Sherwood Forest are national treasures - once they are gone, they will be lost forever.

A huge petition will force the government to rethink its plans. If we can prove how strongly the public are against this, they will have to back down. Please sign the petition now.