CAIRNGORMS NATION­AL PARK AUTHORITY

DRAFT MINUTES OF THE BOARD MEETING

held by telephone/​video con­fer­ence on Fri­day 25^th March at 1.30pm

PRESENT (By video con­fer­en­cing unless stated oth­er­wise) Xan­der McDade (Con­vener) Geva Black­ett Peter Argyle Car­o­lyn Cad­dick (Deputy Con­vener) Deirdre Fal­con­er Pippa Had­ley Janet Hunter John Kirk John Latham

Douglas McAdam Elean­or Mack­in­tosh Wil­lie McK­enna Ian McLar­en Dr Fiona McLean Anne Rae Mac­don­ald Dr Gaen­er Rodger Derek Ross Judith Webb

In Attend­ance: Grant Moir, Chief Exec­ut­ive, Dav­id Camer­on, Dir­ect­or of Cor­por­ate Ser­vices & Deputy CEO Mur­ray Fer­guson, Dir­ect­or of Plan­ning & Place Andy Ford, Dir­ect­or of Nature & Cli­mate Change Gav­in Miles, Head of Stra­tegic Plan­ning Alix Hark­ness, Clerk to the Board

Apo­lo­gies: Wil­lie Munro

Wel­come and Introduction

1. Xan­der McDade, Board Con­vener wel­comed every­one to the meet­ing. Apo­lo­gies were noted.

2. The Con­vener acknow­ledged the huge fire in Brae­mar which was a great loss to that com­munity and the wider Nation­al Park. He exten­ded his thoughts to Ukrain­i­an col­leagues at this time.

Declar­a­tions of Interest

1. The Board Con­vener invited Declar­a­tions of interest. There were no interests declared.

Minutes of Last Meet­ings held – for approval

1. The draft Minutes of the last meet­ing held on 10^th Decem­ber 2021 were agreed with no amendments.

2. The draft Minutes of the meet­ing held on 25^th Feb­ru­ary 2022 were agreed with no amendments.

Mat­ters Arising

1. The Board Con­vener provided an update on the Action points from pre­vi­ous minutes:

   a) 11 June Minutes — At Para. 16(i) — In Hand- Board Busi­ness ses­sion around redu­cing wild­fires will be sched­uled, wild­fire was dis­cussed as part of the NPPP.

   b) 11 June Minutes – Action Point at Para 21 (iv) – In Hand – The Dir­ect­or of Cor­por­ate Ser­vices will talk to the Board Con­vener about bring­ing the ongo­ing review of stra­tegic risk back to the Board via the Gov­ernance Com­mit­tee. Intern­al audit review of organ­isa­tion wide assur­ance com­mis­sioned which will then form basis for dis­cus­sion on risk appet­ite and risk man­age­ment in tan­dem with devel­op­ment of next Cor­por­ate Plan.

   c) 10^th Septem­ber Minutes – Action Point at Para 13i) – Closed — Dir­ect­or of Nature & Cli­mate Change agreed to col­late the mon­it­or­ing res­ults for some not all the spe­cies could be obtained over the last 5 – 10 years but not for indi­vidu­al estates and send it to the Board. Mem­bers were informed of the most up to date inform­a­tion as part of the NPPP evid­ence review.

   d) 10 Sept Minutes – Action Point at Para. 13(ii) – Closed — Dav­id Heth­er­ing­ton, Wood­land Officer gave Board Mem­ber John Lath­am a call to dis­cuss wood­land ripari­an schemes on Don­side pri­or to the Christ­mas recess.

   e) 10 Sept Minutes – Action Point at Para. 13(iii) -In Hand- Peat­land Board vis­it to be organ­ised for the Spring of 2022 — will be part of the sum­mer visits.

   f) 10 Decem­ber Minutes – Action Point at Para. 12i) – In Hand — Out of meet­ing dis­cus­sion by Head of Vis­it­or Ser­vices about the muddy long dis­tant route the respons­ib­il­ity of the High­land Council.

   g) 10 Decem­ber Minutes – Action Point at Para 17i) – In Hand – Dir­ect­or of People and Place to organ­ise site vis­it to looks a path con­di­tion in key areas of Glen­more and Spey­side Way with Wil­lie McK­enna and Deirdre Falconer.

   h) 10 Decem­ber Minutes – Action Point at Para 31i) – Closed – Mem­bers of the Board with any ques­tions about the com­mit­tee minutes to please take up with com­mit­tee chairs, vice-chairs, or Board Convener.

   i) 10 Decem­ber Minutes – Action Point at Para 37i) – Closed — Dir­ect­or of Cor­por­ate Ser­vices arranged for the doc­u­ments relat­ing to the new code of con­duct to be issued to the Board.

   j) 10 Decem­ber Minutes – Action Point at Para 37ii) – Closed — Board Con­vener to write a let­ter of thanks to staff before the Christ­mas recess.

   k) 10 Decem­ber Minutes – Action Point at Para 37iii) – Closed – Aviemore High­land Resort Meet­ing, Mem­bers to con­tact the Board Con­vener with any con­cerns or points.

2. Action Points Arising: None

CEO Report & Board Con­vener Update (Paper 1)

1. Grant Moir, Chief Exec­ut­ive, intro­duced Paper I which was to high­light to Board Mem­bers the main stra­tegic areas of work that are being dir­ec­ted by Man­age­ment Team. These are areas where sig­ni­fic­ant staff resources are being dir­ec­ted, to deliv­er with part­ners the aspir­a­tions of the Nation­al Park Part­ner­ship Plan. He spe­cific­ally brought the fol­low­ing to the Board’s attention:

   a) Cairngorms Nature Big Week­end tak­ing place week­end 13^th to 15^th May 2022 with a com­bin­a­tion of online and face to face events.

   b) This was the first form­al Board meet­ing since the suc­cess­ful Nation­al Park Part­ner­ship Plan (NPPP) Con­sulta­tion which received 1400 com­ments. In due course a form­al con­sulta­tion report will be pro­duced and the revised NPPP would go before the Board in June 2022 for approval.

   c) Anoth­er batch of Sea­son­al Rangers had recently taken up their pos­i­tions, a full com­ple­ment of II for anoth­er busy season.

2. The Board con­sidered the detail in the Paper and dis­cus­sions took place around the following:

   a) With regards to Stra­tegic routes, men­tion of a poten­tial new route from Aviemore to the Moray coast, could more inform­a­tion be provided? CEO advised that Sus­trans were look­ing at Nation­al Cycle routes and advised that the Dir­ect­or of Plan­ning & Place would give the Mem­ber the detail on that after the meeting.

   b) Thanks, giv­en for the full report, clar­ity sought around the Edin­burgh declar­a­tion fund, what was it likely to include? CEO advised that it was linked into nature res­tor­a­tion. Dir­ect­or of Nature & Cli­mate Change explained that it would be a nature res­tor­a­tion fund tar­geted at pub­lic bod­ies and that he was wait­ing to see fur­ther inform­a­tion on what that might mean for the Nation­al Park.

   c) Clar­ity sought around the peat land res­tor­a­tion map­ping, did the data provided include peat depth or is that some­thing we get from NatureScot? CEO explained that the peat maps showed erosion fea­tures and drain­age but not peat depth.

   d) On the top­ic of wood­land cre­ation, did we have a rough idea of the total area of schemes that were in devel­op­ment for wood­land expan­sion in the Nation­al Park at present. CEO advised that there was approx­im­ately 10k Ha of wood­land cre­ation schemes at dif­fer­ent stages.

3. The Board noted the Paper. The Con­vener thanked the Chief Exec­ut­ive and his team on behalf of the Board.

4. Action Point Arising:

   i. Dir­ect­or of People & Place to give Board Mem­ber details sur­round­ing Sus­trans new route from Aviemore to the Moray Coast.

²⁰²²⁄₂₃ Budget Devel­op­ment (Paper 2)

1. Dav­id Camer­on, Dir­ect­or of Cor­por­ate Ser­vices, intro­duced Paper 2 which presents the Cairngorms NPA’s pro­posed budget for the ²⁰²²⁄₂₃ fin­an­cial year. The paper presents the Cairngorms NPA’s expec­ted income for the year from core sources, com­pris­ing Scot­tish Gov­ern­ment resource and cap­it­al grants togeth­er with gen­er­ated income. The paper sets out the planned deploy­ment of those resources across ​“core” organ­isa­tion­al invest­ment on staff and sup­port ser­vices togeth­er with oper­a­tion­al plan invest­ment on pro­ject deliv­ery. The paper also presents the trans­ition­al invest­ment plan for ²⁰²²⁄₂₃, set­ting out the stra­tegic object­ives and work pack­ages deliv­er­ing against those stra­tegic object­ives in the com­ing year. This approach accords with the trans­ition­al arrange­ments in devel­op­ing cor­por­ate plans agreed by the Board in Decem­ber 2021.

2. The Con­vener added that it had been a very suc­cess­ful budget round with the CNPA being awar­ded its largest budget in CNPA his­tory, includ­ing an extra £500k for

3. The Board con­sidered the detail in the Paper and dis­cus­sions took place around the following:

   a) Com­ment made that it was a very good report and praise for bring­ing in addi­tion­al fund­ing. In chal­len­ging eco­nom­ic times, with pres­sure on pub­lic and private fin­ance and on staff­ing work­loads there is some recog­ni­tion that deliv­ery risks will fall more on the cap­it­al pro­gramme deliv­ery: could reas­sur­ance be provided that there were mit­ig­a­tion meas­ures in place ensur­ing the deliv­ery of the cap­it­al part of the plan? Dir­ect­or of Cor­por­ate Ser­vices advised that he was con­scious of cost pres­sures, with cur­rent infla­tion rates rising to 6%, cost pres­sures will fall on resources and cap­it­al side of budget and sig­ni­fic­antly impact the budget. There had been dis­cus­sions on pay nego­ti­ations at the Staff Con­sultat­ive For­um (SCF) and very prag­mat­ic responses received. He provided the reas­sur­ance that the aim was always to come back with a bal­anced break­even net out­turn while accom­mod­at­ing vari­ations over the course of the year. This included cap­it­al pro­gramme deliv­ery. The Dir­ect­or of Cor­por­ate Ser­vices con­firmed he would be keep­ing over­sight of the Stra­tegic Risk Register through­out the year, with the Seni­or Man­age­ment team and through Audit & Risk Com­mit­tee and with any escal­a­tion points back into Board if required. He con­firmed at this stage the Man­age­ment Team have set out budget with best pos­sible fore­cast we can.

   b) Recog­ni­tion that pres­sure on mater­i­als and con­tract­ors and oth­er pro­viders may be an issue for peat­land res­tor­a­tion work in the Nation­al Park. Dir­ect­or of Cor­por­ate Ser­vices provided reas­sur­ance that the risks were being man­aged and that on pro­cure­ment the most recent evid­ence has been more encour­aging with the num­ber of con­tract­ors apply­ing for tenders increas­ing. Cost pres­sures were noted, while there was some con­fid­ence at this stage the budget could be man­aged to accom­mod­ate increases in pro­cure­ment costs.

   c) Ques­tion around hav­ing shovel-ready pro­jects on the back burn­er while recog­nising there was already huge pres­sures on the team. Dir­ect­or of Cor­por­ate Ser­vices advised that the staff would look to devel­op poten­tial shovel-ready pro­jects should the oppor­tun­ity arise dur­ing the year.

   d) Con­cern that there was not suf­fi­cient resource against IT. Dir­ect­or of Cor­por­ate Ser­vices advised that they were cur­rently imple­ment­ing the ser­vice trans­ition from out­look into 365 as a cloud sys­tem and work­ing with the extern­al sup­pli­er. The CNPA has increased the staff and fin­an­cial resource against IT. Any issues would be repor­ted back to the Resources Com­mit­tee and / or Audit and Risk Com­mit­tee at appro­pri­ate times.

   e) Com­ment made about the move away from over pro­gram­ming to a bal­anced pos­i­tion. Reas­sur­ance was sought that the Author­ity were con­tent with the move from over pro­gram­ming. Dir­ect­or of Cor­por­ate Ser­vices advised that he was con­tent with the pos­i­tion to bring it to the Board and that this fol­lowed on from the dir­ec­tion the Board wanted in the pri­or year. More detailed deliv­ery and fin­an­cial phas­ing plans will be developed with seni­or man­agers across the organ­isa­tion to enhance intern­al man­age­ment report­ing and account­ing arrange­ments, with reports in due course to Resources Com­mit­tee and if required to the Board thereafter.

4. The Con­vener thanked the Dir­ect­or of Cor­por­ate Ser­vices and his team and noted the com­plex­ity of the work that goes into this, whilst recog­nising this being a trans­ition­al year which makes it more chal­len­ging than usual.

5. The Board noted:

   a) Agreed the pro­posed budget alloc­a­tions for ²⁰²²⁄₂₃;

   b) Con­sidered the pro­posed trans­ition­al invest­ment plan for ²⁰²²⁄₂₃;

   c) Agreed the trans­ition­al invest­ment plan for ²⁰²²⁄₂₃ as presented;

   d) Iden­ti­fied stra­tegic risks or implic­a­tions posed for the Board’s deliv­ery of its stra­tegic object­ives as covered in the dis­cus­sion, while not­ing the addi­tion­al man­age­ment action in place to mit­ig­ate those risks.

6. Action Points Arising: None.

Stra­tegic Risk Man­age­ment and Mon­it­or­ing Cor­por­ate Per­form­ance – (Paper 3)

1. Dav­id Camer­on, Dir­ect­or of Cor­por­ate Ser­vices, intro­duced Paper 3 which presents an update on the Authority’s per­form­ance to date in work­ing towards deliv­ery of stra­tegic object­ives estab­lished in the 2018 to 2022 Cor­por­ate Plan. The paper focuses on deliv­ery against the Key Per­form­ance Indic­at­ors adop­ted as meas­ures of per­form­ance in deliv­ery of our Cor­por­ate Plan, bring­ing over­sight of the deliv­ery against the cur­rent Cor­por­ate Plan to a con­clu­sion, while high­light­ing by excep­tion any sig­ni­fic­ant con­straints, risks, or short­com­ings on planned deliv­ery. The paper also presents the latest ver­sion of the Stra­tegic Risk Register, fol­low­ing ongo­ing review and mit­ig­a­tion action by the Man­age­ment Team and review by the Audit and Risk Committee.

2. The Con­vener on behalf of the Board thanked the Gov­ernance and per­form­ance Man­ager Vicky Walk­er for coordin­at­ing this work.

3. The Board:

   a) Reviewed the update on cor­por­ate per­form­ance and stra­tegic risk man­age­ment set out in this paper

4. Action Point Arising: None

CNPA Con­sulta­tion Response to Draft Nation­al Plan­ning Frame­work (Paper 4)

1. Gav­in Miles, Head of Stra­tegic Plan­ning intro­duced Paper 4 which provides a brief over­view of the draft Nation­al Plan­ning Frame­work 4 for Scot­land and sets out the pro­posed CNPA response for agree­ment by the Board.

2. The Board con­sidered the detail in the Paper and the fol­low­ing com­ments and obser­va­tions were made:

   a) Ques­tion around policy 16 on Sus­tain­able Tour­ism, sug­ges­tion made to make ref­er­ence to respons­ible tourism.

   b) Com­ment made that there was no men­tion on mon­it­or­ing it and what pro­cess they would adopt for that.

   c) Com­ment made that it was a good response. Ques­tion around the concept of 20min neigh­bor­hoods, con­cern raised that the concept in a rur­al set­ting is hard to define and sug­ges­tion made to say some­thing about that about provid­ing clar­ity around how it should be inter­preted in rur­al areas like the Nation­al Park. CEO advised that the prin­cip­al is pro­moted in NPPP but that there was a need to ensure that it is applic­able in a rur­al set­ting. Head of Stra­tegic Plan­ning agreed to expand on it in the NPPP.

   d) With regards to item 12 could it be explained what it was with the lan­guage used and policies that could be mis­in­ter­preted? Head of Stra­tegic Plan­ning explained that the dif­fi­culty was with cer­tain terms that were too broad, and words like ​‘unac­cept­able’, which did not have a clear defin­i­tion, He fur­ther explained that SG plan­ners under­stood what they are try­ing to do, and they have now involved Loc­al Author­it­ies to help fur­ther explain their terminology.

3. The Board:

   a) Noted the scope of the draft NPF4; and

   b) Endorsed the pro­posed CNPA response to draft NPF4 con­tained in para­graphs 4 – 15 of this paper.

4. Action Point Arising: None.

Code of Con­duct (Paper 5)

1. Dav­id Camer­on, Dir­ect­or of Cor­por­ate Ser­vices, intro­duced Paper 5 which presents the revised Mod­el Code of Con­duct for Non-Depart­ment­al Pub­lic Bod­ies (NDPBs) issued by the Stand­ards Com­mis­sion for Scot­land, togeth­er with updated guid­ance accom­pa­ny­ing the Mod­el Code. The paper seeks the Board’s agree­ment to adopt the revised Mod­el Code as the Code of Con­duct for the Cairngorms Nation­al Park Authority.

2. The Con­vener added that the Code of Con­duct had been dis­cussed and approved by the Gov­ernance Com­mit­tee and Board mem­bers had been sent it for information.

3. The Board approved the adop­tion of the revised Mod­el Code of Con­duct for Non-Depart­ment­al Pub­lic Bod­ies in full and without amend­ment as the Cairngorms NPAs Code of Conduct.

4. Action Point Arising: None.

Draft Minutes of Com­mit­tee meet­ings 11^th Feb­ru­ary 2022

1. Dav­id Camer­on, Dir­ect­or of Cor­por­ate Ser­vices, intro­duced the fol­low­ing draft minutes dated 11^th Feb­ru­ary 2022 of pub­lic meet­ings were presen­ted to the Board but not yet in the pub­lic domain:

   Draft Resources Com­mit­tee Minutes Draft Audit & Risk Com­mit­tee Minutes

He repor­ted that once the Chairs and Vice-Chairs of the Gov­ernance Com­mit­tee and Per­form­ance Com­mit­tee had signed off their respect­ive minutes, these draft minutes would be cir­cu­lated to the remainder of the Board.

1. The CEO reminded mem­bers of the Board if they had any ques­tions about the minutes to please take up with com­mit­tee chairs, vice-chairs or himself.

2. The Board noted the draft minutes of the Board Committees

3. Action Point Arising: None.

AOCB

1. There were no items presented.

2. Motion to move to con­fid­en­tial ses­sion for Gov­ernance Discussion.

Date of Next Meeting

1. Next form­al Board meet­ing to be held on 10^th June 2022.

2. The pub­lic part of this meet­ing closed 14.30.