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Shobley Encroachment: a statement from the New Forest Commoners Defense Association

By on 25/07/2023 in Habitat, News, Planning

We support the NFCDA in their battle against illegal encroachment on Common Land. This guest post was announced today at the New Forest Show by NFCDA Chair Andrew Parry-Norton.

This is a battle we have been fighting for nearly four years now. The owner of Forest Oaks, Ringwood, who also owns some 10 acres of common to the rear of his property, has enclosed an area of some 2/3-acre immediately adjoining his property. This land was formerly available to our depastured stock but they are no longer able to access it.

We had been in negotiation with the owner together with the Verderers and we were hopeful and confident that an agreement had been reached with the owner in early 2020 to resolve the issue that would mean the removal of the encroachment. Unfortunately the owner was not prepared to agree to the proposal put forward by the Verderers and was not concluded.

Since then despite several attempts from us to get the fence removed the owner has refused to comply with our requests or discuss the matter. We reluctantly issued court proceedings at the end of 2022; the owner is defending this case and the projected total costs for this case amount to approximately four hundred thousand pounds.

This sum of money clearly exceeds the financial assets of our organisation and although we have received one or two offers of financial support from local and national organizations, which is much appreciated, we need to raise a further large sum in order to continue fighting the case.

This is of fundamental importance not only to the Commoners of the New Forest but it could well affect over 100,000 acres of Commons throughout England and Wales.

Although we remain very grateful that the Verderers having supported us in this fight we are extremely disappointed that neither the NPA nor Natural England have contributed in any way to assisting us, either using their physical or financial resources.

Indeed we would welcome support from any Forest stakeholders, this is not a battle we can win on our own, not because we do not have a strong case but simply because of the potential level of resources we will need to administer this action.

We have therefore decided to start a Crowd Funding Page; the Official Launch will be at the New Forest Show at the end of this month and we do urge everybody who has a desire to see the forest remain as it is and available for grazing animals, to support this page in as generous a manner as they can afford.

This really could be the thin end of the wedge and may eventually result in the loss of many acres of common land both here and indeed throughout the country if we do not succeed.

We will post a link New Forest Commoners Defense Association‘s crowdfunding page when it becomes available.  (in the meantime, follow the link to their main website).
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Solent Freeport Requires Regard for the New Forest National Park

By on 20/10/2022 in News, Planning

We made this statement regarding the Solent Freeport at the New Forest National Park Authority meeting on 20th October 2022.  The Authority agenda included a discussion of the Freeport, its possible bid for announced Investment Zones, and whether the inclusion of the District, including the Park in the “outer boundary” of the Freeport would undermine the Park, or the habitat protections of the Park’s designated land.

Currently the Solent Freeport Board includes representatives of Hampshire County Council, New Forest District Council, Southampton City Council, Portsmouth City Council, Eastleigh Borough Council and Havant Borough Council, and representation from Associated British Ports (ABP), Solent Gateway and the Solent Local Enterprise Partnership(LEP).  The National Park Authority is not a Solent Freeport Board member, but attends meetings in a non-voting capacity.

Text below in square brackets [ ] was omitted from the reading to the Authority, in order to remain within the time requirements for public speaking at Authority meetings.  Notes provided for Authority Members, along with this statement, may be read here, and are given as direct footnote links below.  Further context is in THIS article (forthcoming).

Solent Freeport

The case for excluding NFNPA from a formal decision-making role in relation to the Solent Freeport has not been made. Policy objectives for the Freeport are likely to conflict with both the Statutory Purposes of National Parks, and the 25 Year Environment Plan, notably regarding responsibilities for the protection, conservation, and natural capital enhancement of environmentally sensitive areas. In those respects, the New Forest is of unique global importance which must be recognised. We are deeply concerned by the prospect of further pressure on the special qualities of the National Park due to the proposed Solent Freeport. Simple retention of an ordinary planning regime[i], as promised by New Forest District Council (NFDC), will not ease our concerns, for these reasons:

  • The stated aim for the Port expressed by the Solent LEP [in the consultation [ii]], proponent and Board Member of the Port, is to establish a “Virtual Planning Authority”. They suggest Freeports remove “existing environmental regulations” they claim limit incentives to investors.
  • The current Planning and Infrastructure Bill[iii] and the Levelling Up and Regeneration Bill may expand the definition of Nationally Significant Infrastructure Planning removing local oversight.
  • The ambition of ABP to develop the Dibden Bay SSSI [seen as “inevitable” by their previous chief exec[iv]].
    • They’ve already registered the site for both Tax and Customs [as a fait accompli].
    • NFDC adopted ABP’s label “ABP Strategic Land Reserve” ignoring its habitat designation.
  • The Government’s initial response to the NPA’s queries about the Freeport implications[v] does not mention the Duty of Regard and states only that NPPF [National Planning Policy Framework] policy for protected landscapes will continue to apply within Freeport outer zones, excluding the Dibden Bay SSSI.
  • The Duty of Regard has already been eroded by NFDC in their most recent local plan. [as noted by the RSPB and HIOW Wildlife Trust, the unsustainable level of housing development and inadequate mitigation for pressure on the Forest] [vi]
  • Hampshire County Council and other proponents for the widening of the A326 [in part to support the Freeport development] have ignored the consequences to wildlife corridors and public access, showing lack of Duty of Regard. [vii]
  • RSPB, and Campaign for National Parks have expressed concerns about Investment Zones and Freeports. [viii]

The Duty of Regard is key, the National Park will be negatively impacted by Freeport development. The National Park should have oversight through direct representation. The overlapping private interests of ABP, Solent LEP and Solent Gateway should not have disproportionate control.

[The notion that the Freeport could be a useful source of mitigation funding from developments is deeply flawed. The current level of development already in the NFDC Local Plan is well beyond the potential for mitigation. Development beyond these levels involves accepting irreversible damage which cannot be balanced by such small benefits. [ix]]

The Dibden Bay SSSI, an important site in its own right, is a vital support to winter waders that breed on the Open Forest. Its protection, as well as the many other sites for nature connectivity, wildlife corridors and green infrastructure, should be part of the priorities for this Authority outside the park, where nature doesn’t recognize administrative boundaries.

We ask this Authority to thoroughly weigh the implications on the Park’s Purposes, before supporting a Freeport or Investment Zone, or any planning regime that undermines the Duty of Regard. And if it goes forward, regardless of where the boundaries are drawn, the Authority should demand a place on the Board of the Freeport as a full voting member, and pursue a clear policy to block the destruction of the Dibden Bay SSSI.

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Presentment: Ashurst Hospital Site

By on 17/04/2019 in News, Planning

1909 Map including the layout of the Ashurst Workhouse

 

We welcome a guest post from our former chair, Peter Roberts, who gave this Presentment in this month’s Verderers Court.

Ashurst workhouse from the west c.1907.

My name is Peter Roberts. I am a former Verderer and a former resident of Ashurst.

Yesterday the National Park Authority published their Plan Amendments which includes the use of of land at Ashurst for housing. This land is the former Workhouse Site, which was taken from the open Forest in 1836. When the grant for the land was made there was a specific reservation that in the event of the workhouse no longer being required it should revert to the Forest. Seven acres of the site were returned to the Forest in 1988, thanks mainly to the work of the late Verderer David Stagg.

The remaining land is commonable land from which the common rights have never been removed. It should be returned to the open Forest for grazing for the commoners stock. I implore you to object most strongly to the National Park Proposed Main Modifications and work towards returning this land to the rightful users.

1836 Site Plan

Notes:
The grant was made on 31st December 1836 and may be found in the Wood Lease Books now held by the Forestry Commission in Queen’s House (Vol 4 pp 279-285). The original is at Kew: NRA ‘Grants of land for Workhouse 1836-1915’, F10/52 4079/1.

We thank Peter for permission to share this Presentment, and his notes.  For the 150th Anniversary of the New Forest Association (aka Friends of the New Forest) he wrote our history in Saving the New Forest.

At last month’s court, in a short, off the cuff, two sentence presentment, one of our trustees similarly urged the Verderers to assert the Forest’s rights to the land in question. Our planning committee had made a representation to the New Forest National Park Local Plan Inspectors regarding the site.  Notes from both Peter Roberts and Richard Reeves regarding the site were shared privately with the Verderers at that time.

New Forest Local Plan Modifications are open to consultation until 31st May 2019.  More information, including the additional Ashurst Workhouse allocation, which does NOT recognize nor even mentions the Forest rights of the portion not returned to the Forest, may be found here.

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Presentment: Our Objections to Local Plans

By on 17/10/2018 in Habitat, News, Planning

New Forest District Council’s Local Plan aims to build 10,500 homes over ten years. In their own summary they admit this is 3 to 4 times their current development rate.  13 of 20 of their proposed strategic development sites are on Green Belt.

This will increase the population in the district and park by roughly 7 times that of Lyndhurst.  One of these “Lyndhurst”s will be an entire new village at Fawley, which will increase the population of the park by 10 %, at the wrong end of the already stressed A326 transport corridor.  This would have a severe recreational impact on the Forest with disturbance to habitat and livestock, and would further urbanize the already saturated Waterside Area, requiring upgrades to the roads that due to that saturation would necessarily encroach onto the highly protected Crown Lands within the National Park, and would increase traffic westward across the Park on roads already animal accident blackspots.

The New Forest National Park Authority and NFDC share a viability study that accepts the developer’s contention that in order to develop 1500 homes at Fawley, they must build 120 as premium homes on a Site of Importance to Nature Conservation in the National Park.  Adjacent to the Power Station site, Tom Tiddler’s Ground is a young coastal grazing marsh that could easily qualify for SSSI status if it were grazed by commoners livestock[1].  [see addendum below for alternatives offered]

The National Park is failing its statutory purposes to conserve and enhance by adopting the poor logic and questionable feasibility behind the NFDC support for the Waterside development, and lack of objection to the scale of NFDC’s 10,500 home plan.  The Park Authority and District Council should be working together to fulfil their legal obligation to protect the Forest, not to undermine that protection for the sake of NFDC’s political objectives.

The Friends of the New Forest / NFA are objecting to the NFNPA Local Plan under examination in November, before your next court, because if accepted as it is, it lays the groundwork for NFDC’s Local Plan which presumes the need and scale of the NFDC objectives, including the destruction of Tom Tiddler’s Ground.

The Government 25 Year Environment Plan promises greater protection for National Parks and both designated and undesignated habitats, and a review for possible expansion of the boundaries of National Parks.  The Park’s own policy should only allow major development under exceptional circumstances.  10,500 homes in the ostensible buffer around the Park, the intentional destruction of Important habitat, and the decimation of Green Belt flies in the face of any presumption that the National Park provides the Forest with any protection.

We ask the Verderers, in their role as a statutory consultee to support our objections, particularly when the NFDC Local Plan is considered.  This is a generational threat to the Forest, and hope that all present in both official and private capacities will join us in this fight.

[1] Indeed previous attempts to do just that failed only due to unreasonable demands from the Power Station management.

ADDENDUM:
The current proposals range from 1500 homes on both the site and onto the SP25 land, or 4000 homes on the site alone (that profitability in the viability study equates 120 homes on the Park’s area with 2500 homes difference, is an example of the nonsense that the viability study purports, and a veiled threat to make an even more unacceptable development).  Even within the Power Station site, the proposals are not limited as they should be to just the former industrial area.  There is also an entirely cracked logic that if these homes must be built to fund the Power Station site development, that they must be built there, and not anywhere else in the country, and they must be built first, but with no guarantee that the industrial site would be developed subsequently.

The current proposals for the Power Station site, which do not demonstrate exceptional circumstances required for major development within the Park, should either be abandoned, scaled down to minor settlement, or mixed use for recreation or perhaps most fittingly for its industrial heritage sustainable power generation in the form of a solar array, all of which should be confined wholly to the industrial area alone, and outside the 400m zone of any future and very likely SPA designation.

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NFA Planning and Transport 2017-18

By on 14/04/2018 in News, Planning

Here Planning and Transport Chair, Graham Baker weighs in, with some frustrations, over the past year, full of mounting concerns of increased pressure on the Forest. Part of our series of Annual Reports relevant to our AGM on Saturday 21st April 2018.

It is difficult to read the 2016 planning report and not to conclude that 2017 has been a largely wasted year. You will therefore excuse any frustrations that show.

There remains little between our Association and the National Park Authority (NPA) over individual planning applications. In the defined villages we are succeeding in coping with the need to increase central housing densities without disturbing the spacious nature elsewhere and coping with the reduction in retail outlets without losing the vitality of High Streets. Residents agree that the type of housing required is modest, suitable for younger people starting out and older people downsizing. But we are challenged by developers’ desire to build what is most profitable without regard to local need; currently this is managed flats for old people who can afford high charges.

Second home ownership and short-term letting are growing at a rate that could exceed the planned increase in housing numbers. This sometimes requires planning permission and it is always worth knowing the extent of the problem, so please let us know if it happening near to you.

In the countryside problems remain dispersed but accumulatively erode character and traditions. Commoning properties are sold to the extremely well off who then seek to convert their humble holding into something else. Extensions are maximised, tatty outbuildings are replaced by three car garages with fully equipped offices above, large loose boxes are replaced by a row of pretty stables, ménages replace a pleasing adjacent paddock and elaborate electric gates or cattle grids replace five bars. Any common grazing land owned outside the new fence is “tidied” – this usually means easing the entry of the Land Rover Evoque by dumping tonnes of gravel on common grazing land. Often these activities do not break planning rules. Where it does we seeks first to have the applicant reconsider and secondly seek refusal.

Discussions continue on the revised Local Plans of the National Park and NFDC. We have achieved protection for the NF Special Protection Area broadly similar to that of the Thames Basin Heaths. This caused several proposed housing sites to be withdrawn, but rather than reduce numbers, NFNPA sought more sites, previously considered unsuitable, to keep the likely new dwelling numbers at around 35 per annum. The average house price in the Park is £581,000, over 15 times average earnings and there is a desperate need for affordable homes for local people. The NPA recognise the problem but their solutions lack ambition. We believe a straightforward policy that all new housing should be affordable stands the best chance of resisting incessant government meddling and developer manipulation and that the NPA should accept a greater role in securing underutilised publicly owned land in the villages for development.

Since we have become a National Park, the NPA’s own data reports that the success of many species of ground and low nesting birds has suffered a “marked decline”. The universally agreed cause is disturbance from recreation and the extra dwellings being built around the New Forest will result in an additional million visitors per annum, considerably worsening the problem. Despite this it is difficult to find any action stemming from the NPA’s 75 page Recreational Management Strategy since its publication in 2010. The planning committee will do all it can to ensure the emerging Local Plans recognise recreational pressure on the National Park as the primary problem facing the New Forest and that compensation from developers is used in forthright measures to reverse the problem. The relocation or closure Forestry Commission car parks will be one of the most effective management tools in reducing disturbance and we have developed sophisticated mapping techniques to measure levels of disturbance from them.

In 2017, planning volunteers have scrutinised over 1,000 planning applications, responded to a dozen consultations, developed maps, maintained good relationships with the parishes, plotted aircraft routes and surveyed overhead cable routes (with some success the line south and west of Burley is to be buried in 2018). Our thanks go to them all.

Planning & Transport Committee Chair – Graham Baker

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NFA Comment on Dibden Bay

By on 28/10/2016 in Habitat, News, Planning
The perennial threat of development of Dibden Bay by Associated British Ports (ABP) for a container port appears to be back on the table according to stories yesterday from both the BBC and the Southampton Daily Echo, with ABP complaining of limited capacity and Chancellor of the Exchequer, Phillip Hammond saying he would support the development which would no longer be subject to a local planning inquiry, but would be considered a National Infrastructure Project.

Our Chair, John Ward, has commented:

Dibden Bay at Low Tide - geograph.org.uk - 386918
The harmful impacts to wildlife and to the landscape of the New Forest that would be caused by developing Dibden Bay as a container port would be no less today, tomorrow or in the coming decade than they would have been in 2004 when a lengthy planning inquiry led to the rejection of a similar proposal.

The one thing of major significance to have happened since then has been the designation of the New Forest National Park, recognising that in addition to its massive importance for habitats and wildlife the New Forest is one of ‘the finest landscapes in England’. Government national planning policy emphasises the great weight that should be given to conserving the landscape and scenic beauty of National Parks.

Dibden Bay is immediately adjacent to the boundary of the New Forest National Park. There is no hinterland, no buffer zone. At present on one side of this line there is Forest heathland and trees and on the other the environmentally important marsh and reclaimed land of Dibden Bay. Apart from the destruction of valuable habitat, a container port would bring vast cranes reaching far into the sky, 24 hour intensive lighting and greatly increased traffic not just from transporting containers but serving all of the ancillary activity that would spill out across surrounding areas.

The west side of Southampton Water is already a busy area jostling against the fragile special qualities of the New Forest. It is no place for further major development.

Fracking the Forest?

By on 10/10/2016 in Habitat, News, Planning

 

With the Government taking the decision on fracking away from Lancashire County Council on 6th October 2016, this brief review of our position and the possibility of hydraulic fracturing in this region could be of use.

The NFA support the position of the Campaign For National Parks, that fracking in or under our National Parks has significant environmental impacts – polluting groundwater, damaging the landscape and ruining tranquility, and is inappropriate for the setting.  While we’ve been given to understand that the New Forest’s geology would not be attractive to fracking, we do not want to see this for any of our National Parks or other protected areas. Additionally the precedent it establishes for putting supposed infrastructure demands over these designations is truly chilling. 33 years ago an application by Shell UK to drill for oil and gas in Denny Inclosure was seen off, a battle we shouldn’t have to fight all over again.

Last year, when the Government was in the midst of its U-Turn on a promise not to license fracking in National Parks (eventually arriving at the position that they would allow drilling from just outside National Parks to go under them), Durham University published an article ranking the Parks likelihood for hydraulic fracturing.

New Forest National Park: (Geology: http://bit.ly/1zPvEi0)
A relatively young geology and the rocks close to the surface have no shale gas, shale oil, or coal bed methane potential. Oil and gas have been found in rocks beneath areas close to the New Forest, and there has been exploration in the national park, but there is no evidence of any oil- or gas-bearing shales that would be of interest to fracking companies.

The Briefing Note puts the Forest in its middle Amber (fracking unlikely) category (along with Brecon Beacons, Exmoor, and Northumberland).  It listed four national parks as Red (fracking possible): North York Moors, Peak District, South Downs, and Yorkshire Dales (rocks of possible interest to companies looking to frack for shale gas, shale oil, or coalbed methane).

Whilst researching other goings on at the Verderers Court, this item from 2014 popped up that suggests that fracking could come closer to the Forest than we had supposed:

2014/
7364		 HAMPSHIRE MINERALS & WASTE – OIL AND GAS DEVELOPMENT – REPORT ON MEETING ON 5TH JUNE 2014

Mrs Westerhoff attended the meeting on behalf of the Court. The discussion centred around fracking. Two areas have been identified as potential sites, one being The Weald (as far west as Winchester) and the other is in Dorset reaching east to Thorney Hill adjacent to the New Forest. Whilst the New Forest could be fracked in the future, Mrs Westerhoff understood it would only happen under exceptional circumstances and would be subject to the European legislation protecting the SAC.

–Verderers Minutes June 2014
 DISCHARGE

With the unknown shape of the Brexit plan, the reassurance of protection from the SAC (Special Area of Conservation, a European designation), is under threat unless those protections are formally and thoroughly back-stopped in UK legislation and policy.

The most recent Hampshire Minerals and Waste Plan was adopted in 2013, before the more recent changes in policy and legislation. Subsequently, December 2015 they updated the On-shore Oil & Gas FAQs  (60 pages) and in February 2016 the Hampshire Authorities adopted the Oil and gas development Supplementary Planning Document (SPD) (90 pages).  From the FAQ:

Oil and gas exploration in National Parks

There are known oil and gas resources within Hampshire’s two National Parks and exploration already takes place within the South Downs National Park. There are other examples nationally of where oil and gas development takes place within designated areas. This includes western Europe’s largest oilfield at Wytch Farm, Dorset and sites in Surrey all of which are located within designated areas for nature conservation. The potential impact of a proposal on designations will be taken into account in detail at the planning application stage. The Government has recently announced new planning guidance on unconventional oil and gas development in areas of designation such as National Parks, AONBs and heritage sites (see question 23). There are also policies in the adopted Hampshire Minerals & Waste Plan in relation to minerals developments in designated areas (including Policy 4: Protection of the designated landscape) which will be used to guide whether planning permission should be given in such locations.

In December 2015, there was a vote in the House of Commons regarding hydraulic fracturing in National Parks. MPs voted in favour of allowing hydraulic fracturing to take place 1,200 metres below National Parks and Sites of Special Scientific Interest, as long as the drilling (and associated infrastructure) takes place from outside the designated areas.

There are no licences in the New Forest National Park administrative area.

The Weald in the South Downs National Park is a target for fracking, and would be a potential testbed for the 1200 metre rule.  In September 2016 their Authority rejected a plan for horizontal drilling with hydraulic fracturing.  The applicant believes “this proposal would be supported by the Planning Inspectorate or the Secretary of State in the event of an appeal.”  Given that the British Geological Survey (BGS) estimate 2.2 and 8.6 billion barrels of shale oil beneath the Weald Basin, that appeal could be in with a chance as that may be deemed nationally significant.  We may need to lend our support to our neighbours should this go forward.

The “Reverse the decision to allowing fracking under our national parks.” parliament petition closed on June 19th 2016, with just 38,732 signatures, not enough to be granted a debate(>100k), but enough (>10k) to trigger a Government response, which includes these provisos about protected areas that leave us feeling much less protected:

The protected areas in which hydraulic fracturing will be prohibited have been set out through the Onshore Hydraulic Fracturing (Protected Areas) Regulations, which were formally approved by both Houses of Parliament in December 2015. These regulations ensure that the process of hydraulic fracturing cannot take place above 1200 metres in National Parks, the Broads, Areas of Outstanding Natural Beauty (AONBs), World Heritage Sites and areas that are most vulnerable to groundwater pollution.

Rather than enabling operations in protected areas, these regulations introduce an additional protection to our most sensitive areas and complement the strong protections already provided by the planning system. Moreover, it is worth emphasising that the regulations do not in themselves grant any form of permission for “associated hydraulic fracturing” to take place under any of these sites. They simply establish the principle that hydraulic fracturing should be prohibited by legislation in the specified areas and down to the specified depth. A company looking to develop shale will still need to obtain all the necessary permissions, like planning and environmental permits – and any proposals will necessarily be subject to further detailed consideration and scrutiny under our legal and regulatory regimes.

Orwellian newspeak at its finest “an additional protection to our most sensitive areas”, these sensitive areas would not need additional protection, if they weren’t under threat from this activity in the first place.  They should simply be removed from the equation entirely.  Putting an arbitrary depth of 1200 metres also ignores the fact that those 1200 metres (and the water table) will be drilled through to get to that level, that hole, however well engineered will be connected to the area into which fracking fluid will be pumped at high pressure.  What could possibly go wrong?  Fracking was temporarily suspended in 2011 after earthquakes were caused near Blackpool.

In the 16th December 2015 vote on the Onshore Hydraulic Fracturing (Protected Areas) Regulations 2015 — Extension of Prohibition of Shale Gas Extraction, New Forest East MP Dr. Julian Lewis spoke against the regulation publicly, but abstained from the vote. New Forest West MP Desmond Swayne voted with the Government to allow fracking under National Parks. This is all the more troubling as the west of the Forest is in closest proximity to proposed sites, as noted by David Harrison, Lib Dem councillor, member of the New Forest National Park Authority, “I imagine the west of New Forest will be mainly affected.”

The NFA discussed fracking issues at the November 2015 Council meeting, and although it is unlikely that the Forest’s geology would attract fracking per se, we’re completely against this approach both in principle, and the possibility that it would open the door to similar exploitation. These fights are perennial and ongoing.

The protections offered to designated landscapes and habitats, National Parks and SSSI, et.al. must  be honoured and remain meaningful.

Cables Buried At Buckland Rings

By on 06/10/2016 in News, Planning

There….

Buckland Rings is an Iron Age Hillfort (and modern day informal BMX track) situated on the National Park’s border with Lymington.  To its south and east ran a 33v overhead cable which spoilt  the setting of the fort from the adjacent open access.

The cable has now been buried as part of Scottish and Southern Electricity Networks £15m project to underground 90km of overhead lines in AONB and National Parks in North Scotland and Central Southern England.  A few weeks after the burial no evidence of the work can be seen on the ground.

… and gone.

NFA are now championing the burying of the cable from Hicheslea west along the old Ringwood train line via Slap Bottom to Bagnam.  If anyone out there has an overhead cable in the New Forest National Park they particularly dislike, they should should contact planning@newforestassociation.org. 

— Graham Baker, Chair, Planning Committee

(web editor’s note: perhaps we could reduce our planning committee’s workload by only notifying them of any overhead cables anyone is actually fond of….)