Rural future

This association has, since its inception, stood for the need to protect and encourage the viability of local communities in the Dales.

The Yorkshire Dales National Park Authority (YDNPA) does have a duty of care to the beautiful landscape in the Yorkshire Dales - but it can’t do that on its own. The majority of the work of maintaining this landscape is carried out by farmers and landowners, and the communities to which they belong. This means the YDNPA also has a duty of care to those who live and work in the Yorkshire Dales.

But many communities are becoming unviable as their lifeblood - young people and young families - are leaving. So the YDNPA needs to consider whether its planning system is undermining those communities.

The YDNPA boasts that over 90 per cent of planning applications are approved. This, however, does not take into account the number of applications which are withdrawn or the factors which stop local families applying to convert barns either into homes or for commercial use.

This year a farming family in Litton has had to pay over £10,000 in various fees to obtain permission to convert a barn against officer recommendation. And they are not the only ones who have had to pay so much to fight the system.

Farmers and landowners are very aware of the high cost of working in the national park. Those stories are shared at auction marts and create bad will and a desire to avoid the planning system. That in turn undermines small Dales’ communities.

Sadly there is often the impression that the planning system favours the rich over the poor, the wealthy incomer over those on lower incomes whose families have lived in the Dales for generations.

So we do look forward to the YDNPA working with district and county councils to find ways to encourage young people and young families to stay in the Yorkshire Dales.

PIP LAND

The Association of Rural Communities.