CAIRNGORMS NATION­AL PARK AUTHORITY

DRAFT MINUTES OF THE BOARD MEETING

held by telephone/​video con­fer­ence on Fri­day 12^th June 2020 at 11.00am

PRESENT

(By video con­fer­en­cing unless stated otherwise)

• Xan­der McDade (Con­vener)
• Geva Black­ett (Deputy Convener)
• Peter Argyle
• Car­o­lyn Caddick
• Deirdre Fal­con­er
• Pippa Had­ley
• Janet Hunter
• John Kirk
• John Lath­am

• Douglas McAdam

• Elean­or Mackintosh

• Wil­lie McKenna
• Ian McLar­en
• Dr Fiona McLean
• Wil­li­am Munro
• Anne Rae Macdonald
• Dr Gaen­er Rodger
• Derek Ross
• Judith Webb

In Attend­ance:

• Grant Moir, Chief Executive
• Dav­id Camer­on, Dir­ect­or of Cor­por­ate Services
• Mur­ray Fer­guson, Dir­ect­or of Plan­ning & Rur­al Development
• Dr Peter May­hew, Dir­ect­or of Con­ser­va­tion & Vis­it­or Experience
• Peter Crane, Head of Vis­it­or Services
• Alix Hark­ness, Clerk to the Board

Apo­lo­gies: None.

Wel­come and Introduction

1. Xan­der McDade, the Con­vener, wel­comed every­one to the first live streamed meet­ing of the Board.
2. There were no apologies.

Minutes of Last Meet­ings held – for approval

1. The draft Minutes of the last meet­ing held on 27 March 2020 were agreed with no amendments.

Mat­ters Arising

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

   a) Action Point at Para 19 (i) – Closed – The Con­vener and Dir­ect­or of Cor­por­ate Ser­vices to draft pro­gres­sion plan should the Con­vener and Deputy Con­vener be off at the same time clearly stat­ing the pro­cess. This was cir­cu­lated to the Board once drafted.

2. Action Points Arising: None

Declar­a­tions of Interest

1. Declar­a­tions of interest were invited. There were no interests declared. For trans­par­ency, the fol­low­ing wider respons­ib­il­it­ies of mem­bers with rel­ev­ance to items under con­sid­er­a­tion were stated and noted.

   a) Elean­or Mack­in­tosh sits on Tomin­toul & Glen­liv­et Land­scape Part­ner­ship (TGLP) Board, men­tioned in sev­er­al of papers. b) Doug McAdam chairs south Perth­shire deer man­age­ment group men­tioned in papers.

CEO Report & Con­vener Update (Paper 1)

1. Grant Moir, Chief Exec­ut­ive, intro­duced Paper 1 which high­lights the main stra­tegic work streams that are being dir­ec­ted by Man­age­ment Team, and which cov­ers activ­it­ies of the Con­vener and Board mem­bers. The CEO explained that these are areas where sig­ni­fic­ant staff resources are being dir­ec­ted to deliv­er Nation­al Park Part­ner­ship Plan pri­or­it­ies. He high­lighted the fol­low­ing area:

   a) Cairngorm Nature big 10 days online – this had been a great effort by all con­cerned. Social media stat­ist­ics con­firm the event had been really suc­cess­ful, reach­ing a wide audi­ence and lead­ing officers involved to believe it would be very worth­while to blend things next year with some online con­tent con­tinu­ing. The adapt­a­tions made as a con­sequence of COV­ID have helped to look at dif­fer­ent mod­els going for­ward. b) Nation­al Park Part­ner­ships Cliff bar rela­tion­ship – a Cairngorms pro­ject had been put for­ward for part­ner­ship fund­ing and had been chosen. The CEO high­lighted it is good to see fund­ing com­ing in to sup­port Cairngorms deliv­ery from dif­fer­ent sources. c) A great deal of work was pro­gress­ing on Vis­it­or Man­age­ment as the Author­ity pre­pared with part­ners and stake­hold­ers for the relax­a­tion of travel restric­tions and the start of the vis­it­or sea­son. d) Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan Exam­in­a­tion has gone ahead, and will hope­fully con­clude in sum­mer. e) Stake­hold­er engage­ment has been incred­ible across the Park, with the CEO remark­ing that pos­it­ive part­ner­ship work­ing over the past 3 months has been the best in his experience.

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

   a) Mem­bers com­men­ded the work under­taken by interns, with valu­able research work under­taken. Mem­bers com­men­ted this was excel­lent exper­i­ence for young people and expressed a desire that the Author­ity con­tin­ue and expand these oppor­tun­it­ies if pos­sible. The CEO respon­ded that this rep­res­ents part of our youth employ­ment strategy and Man­age­ment Team will be look­ing at that again in Autumn. b) Mem­bers noted that they took part at home in some of the Cairngorms Nature online events which were really enjoy­able and a good way to engage people who can’t enjoy the Park. Mem­bers enjoyed that dif­fer­ent way inter­act­ing with Park agreed this was inter­est­ing for ongo­ing use in the future. c) Mem­bers ques­tioned wheth­er wood­land expan­sion GIS work is open data that people can access? The CEO respon­ded that the product still needs a bit more work intern­ally, while the inten­tion is to share the final product widely. The work has covered 50% of Park area. d) The Board noted that among the impacts of COVID19 there had been sig­ni­fic­ant reduc­tion in activ­ity and lost income in the ven­ison mar­ket. The CEO respon­ded that Cairngorms Upland Advis­ory Group has dis­cussed that issue, and the Author­ity were engaged in feed­back to Scot­tish Gov­ern­ment, includ­ing being part of a stake­hold­er group on the sub­ject. e) Mem­bers enquired on the level of dia­logue and con­sulta­tion with estates in the Park with regard to the intro­duc­tion of a Sea­son­al Ranger Ser­vice by the Author­ity. The CEO repor­ted that he and man­age­ment were doing extens­ive work through the vis­it­or man­age­ment group, which includes estates which have rangers in park. The CEO has also spoken at stake­hold­er meet­ings which have included Scot­tish Land and Estates and oth­er rel­ev­ant parties, with feed­back all pos­it­ive. Staff will be send­ing out fur­ther inform­a­tion to estates and oth­ers to fur­ther cla­ri­fy ser­vice inten­tions. f) An eager­ness was expressed by some mem­bers to have loc­al people recruited to sea­son­al ranger roles, with ques­tions posed on recruit­ment pro­cess. The CEO respon­ded that the Author­ity is bound by wider expect­a­tions on equal oppor­tun­it­ies around recruit­ment, and updated that 178 people applied; 14 were inter­viewed. After Board decision today it was hoped to award 7 con­tracts. The CEO updated that there was good uptake from loc­al people, while con­firm­ing that all usu­al intern­al com­mu­nic­a­tions on recruit­ment had been done with staff aware it was hap­pen­ing, and also con­firmed that volun­teer rangers could have applied. Mem­bers dis­cussed how volun­teer rangers can come back into the mix in due course and means of deliv­ery that can see how all ranger ser­vices can work well togeth­er. The CEO noted that sub­ject to decisions at Board today, there would be a wider review of vis­it­or man­age­ment ser­vices later in the year. g) The Con­vener con­grat­u­lated all involved in the devel­op­ment of the Sea­son­al Ranger Ser­vice for good work over a short time­frame. h) The Chair of Fin­ance and Deliv­ery Com­mit­tee repor­ted that the Com­mit­tee had reviewed the deliv­ery of the Tomin­toul and Glen­liv­et Land­scape Part­ner­ship pro­ject and the mit­ig­at­ing actions taken by man­age­ment to replace the pro­ject man­ager, who had gone to anoth­er role, and to deal with COV­ID restric­tions on deliv­ery. Mem­bers noted the pro­ject deliv­ery was likely to be exten­ded to the end of Decem­ber 2020. i) Mem­bers noted regard­ing wood­land that there may be an issue of tree stock for plant­ing for a peri­od of time. j) A mem­ber con­grat­u­lated officers on rur­al tour­ism infra­struc­ture ini­ti­at­ives, includ­ing pro­gress­ing ideas for waste dis­pos­al from camper­vans. k) With regard to mem­ber con­cerns about the evol­u­tion of sea­son­al ranger roles into roles akin to spe­cial con­stables, the CEO con­firmed there had been no dis­cus­sion on such roles.

3. The Board noted the Paper.

4. Action Point Arising: None

Cairngorms Nation­al Park Green Recov­ery Plan (Paper 2)

1. Grant Moir, CEO intro­duced Paper 2 which presents the Cairngorms Nation­al Park Authority’s Green Recov­ery Plan for con­sid­er­a­tion by the Board. This plan has been shared in advance for input from part­ners. The CEO noted the Plan will have to change and adapt as the cir­cum­stances change as we look to recov­er from COV­ID. He added that the Green Recov­ery Plan looks to deliv­er across all 4 aims of the Nation­al Park and to do so in an integ­rated way.

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

   a) The Con­vener expressed thanks on behalf of board to staff for huge amount of work which has clearly gone into this paper and pri­or con­sulta­tion with part­ners and brought togeth­er a plan for recov­ery. There was broad agree­ment from mem­bers com­mend­ing the CEO and the team for the work in devel­op­ing these pro­pos­als. b) Mem­bers noted feed­back that the Cairngorms Eco­nom­ic Steer­ing Group was going well, while there was evid­ence of some busi­nesses either not apply­ing for avail­able funds or being refused in some instances. Mem­bers noted there was per­ceived lack of aware­ness amongst busi­nesses of the broad scope of some of the funds avail­able. c) A mem­ber fed back that there was wide­spread sup­port for the recov­ery plan approach being taken, nation­ally and inter­na­tion­ally, with Euro­parc really inter­ested and not­ing Cairngorms is ahead of oth­er pro­tec­ted areas in this regard. d) A mem­ber noted the suc­cess of the Emer­gency Tour­ism Response Group which had been dynam­ic and gen­er­ated wide cooper­a­tion across groups without any sense of geo­graph­ic divide – a bene­fit of vir­tu­al meet­ings. The Con­vener agreed these points and noted that action in Cairngorms had raced ahead of some oth­er areas. e) Mem­bers dis­cussed work being done on Vis­it­or Man­age­ment with the CEO con­firm­ing pre­par­at­ory activ­ity inves­ted in sig­nage, toi­lets, car parks and oth­er inform­a­tion needed by around 15 July. The CEO con­firmed we will put in place all the right things we can with resources we have. f) Mem­bers dis­cussed tone of mes­saging and need to wel­come in pos­it­ive man­ner, rather than do not this and that. The CEO con­firmed officers were work­ing on pos­it­ive guid­ance. g) A mem­ber raised the remain­ing issue of path main­ten­ance as more vis­it­ors come to use the Park. The CEO agreed in the need for appro­pri­ate main­ten­ance, pro­vi­sion and repor­ted that officers are devel­op­ing con­trac­tu­al approaches for those paths the Author­ity is respons­ible for. h) In dis­cus­sion on timetables, the Con­vener noted that spe­cial meet­ings would be arranged on exist­ing Board dates if any ​“mile­stone” agree­ments had to be taken by mem­bers. The CEO also noted that the Fin­ance and Deliv­ery Com­mit­tee would be con­sul­ted at stages of devel­op­ment of aspects of the Green Recov­ery Fund, with fur­ther stra­tegic decisions on this taken at the Board. i) The CEO con­firmed he would be eager for pro­jects for the Green Recov­ery Fund to come for­ward from diverse areas of the Nation­al Park. Devel­op­ment of the Deeside Way as a pro­ject with­in the Plan was dis­cussed, and noted that there was con­sid­er­able work to do in scop­ing route and land man­age­ment agree­ments. j) Mem­bers noted the sup­port of the Cairngorms Nature steer­ing group for the Plan. k) Mem­bers dis­cussed the leg­acy aspects of the Plan and wheth­er, for example, there is poten­tial for ren­ted hous­ing in Park — bring­ing EPC of houses to improved stand­ards. The CEO agreed this is an issue for rur­al Scot­land while a pro­ject around that would need the right part­ners. l) In response to con­cerns about lit­ter, fly tip­ping and oth­er risks the CEO con­firmed officers were work­ing to cir­cu­late signs mes­saging on barbeques and fires. m) In response to ques­tions on the timetable for a Green Recov­ery Fund, the CEO repor­ted that the team need a bit of time to work up cri­ter­ia, with a tar­get for August for bids open. There would be a quick turn­around and the idea of a fund was being pro­moted to allow poten­tial applic­ants to start think­ing about ideas now. n) On wider ques­tions on the rel­at­ive pri­or­ity of ideas set out in the Plan, the CEO explained the pro­pos­als were a list of poten­tial cap­it­al pro­jects. Pri­or­it­isa­tion would take place on an ongo­ing basis and imme­di­ate assessed pri­or­it­ies were being brought for­ward now. Equally, if any fur­ther resources became avail­able over the course of the year, there would be fur­ther eval­u­ation through the Board on where these funds should be redir­ec­ted. o) On fur­ther dis­cus­sion on vis­it­or man­age­ment and mes­saging, mem­bers noted con­cerns among many com­munit­ies about a large increase in vis­it­ors while pub­lic infra­struc­ture such as car parks and toi­lets was not avail­able to cope with vis­it­or num­bers. The CEO con­firmed he and seni­or man­agers were, on daily basis, dis­cuss­ing things with Loc­al Author­it­ies on toi­lets and infra­struc­ture. The recov­ery fund would aim to deliv­er pro­jects that fell into gaps in exist­ing resource pro­vi­sion. p) On the Cairngorms Dark Skies Obser­vat­ory pro­ject, the CEO cla­ri­fied the bid was led by Crown Estate and sought to secure £1.3 mil­lion from European Funds via SNH, with this invest­ment sup­port­ing the devel­op­ment of that bid in an area we are aim­ing to increase vis­it­or foot­fall. A loc­al com­munity group would have to take the final pro­ject for­ward. q) Mem­bers com­men­ted that the green recov­ery plan presen­ted oppor­tun­it­ies for increas­ing resi­li­ence in com­munit­ies while build­ing a green economy.

3. The Board:

   a) Agreed to the Cairngorms Nation­al Park Green Recov­ery Plan. b) Con­sidered along­side the ²⁰²⁰⁄₂₁ Budget & Oper­a­tion­al Plan Review paper. c) A board mem­ber to sit on Green Recov­ery Fund Group – to put for­ward names to the Con­vener. d) Use agreed meet­ing dates for added Board meet­ings to cov­er sig­ni­fic­ant decision points.

4. Action Point Arising:

   i. Identi­fy mem­ber to sit on Green Recov­ery Fund Group.

²⁰²⁰⁄₂₁ Budget and Oper­a­tion­al Plan Review (Paper 3)

1. Dav­id Camer­on, Dir­ect­or of Cor­por­ate Ser­vices intro­duced Paper 3 which presents a review of the Authority’s budget and Oper­a­tion­al Plan for ²⁰²⁰⁄₂₁ in light of the impacts of COVID19 affect­ing the Author­ity since com­mence­ment of the fin­an­cial year. He explained that the paper presents an over­view of the Authority’s income and expendit­ure pos­i­tion in the year to date. The expendit­ure pos­i­tion focuses primar­ily on payroll pos­i­tion to date, which rep­res­ents a key indic­at­or of the reli­ab­il­ity of ini­tial budget estim­ates at such an early stage in the year. He went on to advise that the paper con­siders the pos­i­tion of the ²⁰²⁰⁄₂₁ Budget and Oper­a­tion­al Plan invest­ment pro­pos­als in con­text both of the man­age­ment of invest­ments between ²⁰¹⁹⁄₂₀ and ²⁰²⁰⁄₂₁ fin­an­cial years, and of the assessed impacts of COVID19 restric­tions on oper­a­tions. He added that the paper fol­lows con­sid­er­a­tion of these mat­ters by the Fin­ance and Deliv­ery Com­mit­tee at its meet­ing of 22 May 2020.

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

   a) Some rangers with­in NP were fur­loughed oth­er rangers ser­vices didn’t fur­lough their staff. Grant funds had been reduced where rangers were fur­loughed as we can­not double fund. b) Wheth­er the Dark Skies Pro­ject rep­res­en­ted a niche mar­ket? The CEO advised this is not a niche mar­ket, rather a grow­ing tour­ism mar­ket, with Cairngorms the fur­thest north Dark Skies Park in world, with poten­tial to drive tour­ism in shoulder and winter months. Anoth­er mem­ber noted while hav­ing con­cerns going for­ward the pro­ject rep­res­en­ted a poten­tial unique selling point for the area. Mem­bers noted there was a risk factor with the pro­ject, while the Dir­ect­or of Cor­por­ate Ser­vices noted all pro­jects at ini­ti­ation rep­res­en­ted a deliv­ery risk to some degree and our nor­mal busi­ness was to man­age that risk. He noted that this rep­res­en­ted an alloc­a­tion of funds, not a cash trans­fer. If the pro­ject stalled there was poten­tial in nor­mal man­age­ment of funds to real­loc­ate funds else­where. c) In response to com­ment on the scale of the invest­ment, the CEO and Dir­ect­or of Cor­por­ate Ser­vices noted this was not a large scale invest­ment in the con­text of a range of oth­er pro­ject inter­ven­tions under man­age­ment. Dir­ect­or of Cor­por­ate Ser­vices high­lighted that when we look at any pro­ject apprais­al, the stand­ard apprais­al is on the min­im­um amount of money we at NPA can put in, to make a pro­ject hap­pen. d) On the Dark Skies pro­ject timeline, the CEO con­firmed if the applic­ants don’t apply for grant from SNH this year they will miss the bid. e) In response to a query on cost­ing of the sea­son­al rangers the Dir­ect­or of Cor­por­ate Ser­vices con­firmed cost is based on band B1, recog­niz­ing staff in those bands work on 7day week, slightly enhanced than nor­mal band B, inclus­ive of nation­al insur­ance, pen­sion con­tri­bu­tions. The salary was above Scot­tish liv­ing wage. f) On the timeline for the pro­ject, the Dir­ect­or of Cor­por­ate Ser­vices explained that some recruit­ment aspects had to be taken for­ward pri­or to this meet­ing if staff were to be secured in time for the sum­mer relax­a­tion of travel restric­tions. How­ever, final con­tract award had been delayed pending the final decision of the Board at this meet­ing. The Con­vener noted this point and also high­lighted the pre­vi­ous dis­cus­sion to have more flu­id Board meet­ing dates where spe­cif­ic mile­stone decisions were required. g) The CEO cla­ri­fied there was no CNPA fund­ing in the Glen­more route exten­sion pro­pos­als. h) Mem­bers wel­comed work on pro­cure­ment high­lighted in the paper to secure as much eco­nom­ic bene­fit for the Park from the Authority’s spend­ing as pos­sible, and that work would be done on aware­ness rais­ing with­in loc­al busi­nesses on how to inter­act with pro­cure­ment processes.

3. The Board:

   a) Noted that payroll costs are on budget for ²⁰²⁰⁄₂₁ and there are no areas of risk of over­spend cur­rently iden­ti­fied with­in cur­rent year budget mon­it­or­ing. b) Agreed that £0.271 mil­lion iden­ti­fied in this paper can be released from cur­rent year budget pro­vi­sions. c) Agreed to redeploy­ment of £0.266 mil­lion to Green Recov­ery Plan actions iden­ti­fied in this paper. d) Agreed to com­mis­sion the Glen­more NMU route exten­sion should cap­it­al fund­ing be secured for this project.

4. Action Point Arising:

   i. Devel­op Prin­ciples and Cri­ter­ia for Green Recov­ery Fund.

Nation­al Park Part­ner­ship Plan 2017 – 2022 Deliv­ery Update for 2019 – 20 (Paper 4)

1. Grant Moir, CEO intro­duced Paper 4 which presents an update on deliv­ery against the Cairngorms Nation­al Park Part­ner­ship Plan 2017 – 2022 for the year ²⁰¹⁹⁄₂₀.

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

   a) On the suite of stra­tegic plans, the CEO con­firmed that the LDP is a require­ment, as would be a Loc­al Devel­op­ment Strategy if we have LEAD­ER or an equi­val­ent replace­ment while the oth­ers are with­in our gift and there may be oth­er press­ing strategy require­ments to sup­port the next NPPP. b) Mem­bers ques­tioned wheth­er there is an object­ive way of meas­ur­ing wheth­er some­thing green or amber in the risk rat­ing or just a sub­ject­ive judge­ment. The CEO con­firmed there is a degree of sub­jectiv­ity though rat­ings are dis­cussed with as many as pos­sible to seek consensus.

3. The Board:

   a) Reviewed the update on deliv­ery against the Cairngorms Nation­al Park Part­ner­ship Plan 2017 – 2022 set out in this paper. b) High­lighted any achieve­ments or excep­tions which, from a stra­tegic lead­er­ship per­spect­ive, Board mem­bers believe are of par­tic­u­lar sig­ni­fic­ance to the deliv­ery of the Authority’s stra­tegic objectives.

4. Action Point Arising: None

AOCB

1. Grant Moir CEO and Pete Crane, Head of Vis­it­or Ser­vices provided the fol­low­ing update on Vis­it­or Man­age­ment Plans. They made the fol­low­ing points:

   a) Vis­it­or man­age­ment plans are on web­site and frame­work with CBP went out with press release yes­ter­day b) Feed­back will be provided to those who atten­ded com­munity meet­ings: this being sent out today c) Happy to talk fur­ther about sig­nage, with mem­bers advised to have a look at man­age­ment plans and phone either Grant or Pete if any fur­ther questions.

2. The Board dis­cussed the update and had the fol­low­ing com­ments and points of clarity:

   a) A wish to dis­cuss the Car­rbridge Caper pro­ject at Board at some point. b) Agreed that minutes of Board Com­mit­tees be cir­cu­lated to all board mem­bers. c) Cla­ri­fic­a­tion sought on elec­tion times­cale for Plan­ning Convener.

3. The Chair of the Audit and Risk Com­mit­tee repor­ted that the Com­mit­tee had been asked to look at the Cairngorms Caper­cail­lie Pro­ject. The Com­mit­tee had, at its meet­ing that morn­ing, looked at the audit and assur­ance point of view of the pro­ject with intern­al and extern­al aud­it­ors in attend­ance. The Com­mit­tee had found gen­er­al sound assur­ance on how pro­ject has been run, and while there were some com­mu­nic­a­tion issues in begin­ning, those have been acknow­ledged and improve­ments made with loc­al com­munity. Gen­er­al feel­ing with those in attend­ance that with almost everything we do there will always be people who will have a con­trary opin­ion. Over­all, the Com­mit­tee had found that the pro­ject had delivered from a sound basis of controls.

4. More widely, it had been noted that the Author­ity need to keep per­spect­ive and a pro­por­tion­ate view of repu­ta­tion­al risk: issues exper­i­enced would be minor com­pared to feed­back if caper­cail­lie were to go extinct in the Park.

5. Aud­it­ors had added that from hear­ing dis­cus­sions on reviews and actions taken intern­ally they could see noth­ing they would add from audit and assur­ance point of view. There is a need to note vast major­ity of part­ners value the project.

6. The Con­vener noted that stake­hold­ers and people of all views should be encour­aged to respond to the con­sulta­tion that is ongoing.

7. Action Points Arising: None

Date of Next Meeting

1. Next form­al Board meet­ing to be held on 11 Septem­ber 2020.

2. The meet­ing con­cluded at 13.45.