Cairngorms Nation­al Park Author­ity Annu­al Report and Accounts ²⁰²²⁄₂₃

Annu­al report and accounts ²⁰²²⁄₂₃

…an out­stand­ing nation­al park, enjoyed and val­ued by every­one, where nature and people thrive together…

AITH­ISG BHLIADH­NAIL AGUS CUN­NTAS­AN ²⁰²²⁄₂₃

…SÀR PHÀIRC NÀISEANTA, A THA A’ CÒRDADH RIS A H‑UILE DUINE AGUS AIR A BHEIL IAD UILE A’ CUR LUACH, AGUS FAR A BHEIL NÀDAR AGUS DAOINE A’ SOIRBHEACHA…

Con­tents

Sec­tion	Page
1 Per­form­ance Report	3
1.1 Key Per­son­nel and spon­sor­ing Body	3
1.2 Chief Executive’s Forward	5
1.3 The Park Authority	7
1.4 Stra­tegic Aims and Pri­or­it­ies 2022⁄23 and beyond	12
1.5 Key issues and Risks	15
1.6 Fin­an­cial Per­form­ance Summary	15
1.7 Oper­at­ing Per­form­ance Summary	23
2 Account­ab­il­ity Report	33
2.1 Gov­ernance Report	33
2.1.1 Dir­ect­ors’ Report	33
2.1.2 State­ment of Nation­al Park Authority’s Responsibilities	40
2.1.3 State­ment of Board’s Responsibilities	41
2.1.4 State­ment of the Account­able Officer’s Responsibilities	42
2.2 Gov­ernance Statement	43
2.3 Remu­ner­a­tion report and key inform­a­tion on staff	52
2.4 Par­lia­ment­ary account­ab­il­ity disclosures	70
2.5 Inde­pend­ent auditor’s report to the mem­bers of the Cairngorm Nation­al Park Author­ity, the Aud­it­or Gen­er­al for Scot­land and the Scot­tish Government	72
3 Fin­an­cial Statements	78
3.1 State­ment of Com­pre­hens­ive Net Expenditure	78
3.2 State­ment of Fin­an­cial Position	79
3.3 State­ment of Cash Flows	80
3.4 State­ment of Changes in Tax­pay­ers’ Equity	81
3.5 Notes to the Fin­an­cial Statements	82
Appendix 1 Accounts Direction	104

1 Per­form­ance Overview

Cairngorms Nation­al Park Author­ity presents this Annu­al Report and Accounts for the year from 1 April 2022 to 31 March 2023 in accord­ance with The Nation­al Parks (Scot­land) Act 2000.

The accounts have been pre­pared on a going con­cern basis as the Board and Account­able Officer believe that future liab­il­it­ies will be met from a com­bin­a­tion of cash budget alloc­a­tion from the Scot­tish Gov­ern­ment, future grants from part­ner agen­cies, and income from chargeable activities.

This over­view out­lines the pur­pose of the Author­ity and its per­form­ance dur­ing the year.

1.1 Key Per­son­nel and Spon­sor­ing Department

Spon­sor­ing body: Envir­on­ment and Forestry Dir­ect­or­ate, Nat­ur­al Resources Divi­sion, Scot­tish Government

The Nation­al Park Author­ity Board is made up of nine­teen Board Mem­bers. Five mem­bers are elec­ted by the com­munity, sev­en are appoin­ted by Scot­tish Min­is­ters, and sev­en fol­low­ing nom­in­a­tions by the Loc­al Author­it­ies. The Board is led by the Con­vener and Deputy Convener.

Con­ven­or: Sandy Brem­ner — appoin­ted 26 May 2023 (Con­ven­or from July 2023) Xan­der McDade, Chair Gov­ernance Com­mit­tee (Con­ven­or to July 2023)

Board mem­bers:

• Chris Beat­tie — appoin­ted 1 Octo­ber 2022
• Geva Black­ett — reappoin­ted 1 Octo­ber 2022
• Peter Cos­grove — appoin­ted 7 Septem­ber 2023
• Kenny Deans — appoin­ted 23 March 2023
• Paul Gibb — appoin­ted 23 March 2023
• Han­nah Grist — appoin­ted 26 May 2023
• Rus­sell Jones — appoin­ted 1 Octo­ber 2022
• John Kirk — re-elec­ted 23 March 2023
• Bill Lob­ban — appoin­ted 1 Octo­ber 2022
• Lauren Mac­Cal­lum — appoin­ted 23 March 2023
• Dr Fiona McLean – reappoin­ted 1 Novem­ber 2022
• Elean­or Mack­in­tosh — re-elec­ted 23 March 2023
• Duncan Miller – appoin­ted 9 Novem­ber 2023
• Steve Mickle­wright – appoin­ted 26 May 2023
• Anne Ross — appoin­ted 1 Octo­ber 2022
• Derek Ross — reappoin­ted 1 Octo­ber 2022

Resigned Board members:

• Peter Argyle — resigned 30 Septem­ber 2022
• Car­o­lyn Cad­dick — Deputy Con­ven­or — resigned 30 Septem­ber 2022
• Deirdrie Fal­con­er — resigned 21 March 2023
• Pippa Had­ley — resigned 30 Septem­ber 2022
• Janet Hunter – resigned 7 Septem­ber 2023
• John Lath­am — resigned 30 Septem­ber 2022
• Douglas McAdam – resigned 31 Octo­ber 2023
• Anne Rae Mac­Don­ald — resigned 31 March 2023
• Ian Maclar­en — resigned 30 Septem­ber 2022
• Wil­lie McK­enna — resigned 23 March 2023
• Wil­li­am Mun­ro — resigned 31 March 2023
• Dr Gaen­er Rodger ‑resigned 31 Octo­ber 2023
• Judith Webb — resigned 31 Janu­ary 2023

The Board agrees the over­all dir­ec­tion of the Author­ity and over­sees the work of the Chief Exec­ut­ive and Nation­al Park staff. The exec­ut­ive man­age­ment of the Author­ity is under­taken by an Exec­ut­ive team that com­prises the Chief Exec­ut­ive and three Directors.

Chief Exec­ut­ive and Account­able Officer: Grant Moir

Dir­ect­ors:

• Dav­id Camer­on — Cor­por­ate Ser­vices and Deputy Chief Exec­ut­ive Officer
• Mur­ray Fer­guson — Plan­ning and Place
• Andy Ford — Nature and Climate

1.2 Chief Executive’s Forward

I have pleas­ure in present­ing the Cairngorms Nation­al Park Authority’s Annu­al Report and Accounts cov­er­ing its 19^th year of oper­a­tion, from 1 April 2022 to 31 March 2023.

Toward the end of March, I cel­eb­rated 10 years as Chief Exec­ut­ive Officer of the Park Author­ity and this gave me cause to reflect on the massive change there has been over those years. The Park Author­ity is a very dif­fer­ent organ­isa­tion from 10 years ago and there is a tre­mend­ous amount of work being done out on the ground in the Nation­al Park across our key themes of Nature, People and Place.

The launch of the Nation­al Park Part­ner­ship Plan 2022 – 27 in August 2022 and the staff con­fer­ence in Novem­ber sig­nalled the start of a new chapter post-pan­dem­ic. The Nation­al Park Part­ner­ship Plan is an ambi­tious plan set­ting out our approach between now and 2045. It was developed in col­lab­or­a­tion with over 100 part­ners and is driv­ing work both with­in the Park Author­ity and across the Nation­al Park as a whole.

The Park Author­ity con­tin­ued through­out the year to deliv­er on our key stra­tegic pri­or­it­ies. This involved provid­ing effect­ive and effi­cient pub­lic ser­vices around our stat­utory func­tions of plan­ning and out­door access, as well as work­ing with a diverse range of part­ners to com­plete pro­jects on the ground and deliv­er the col­lect­ive Nation­al Park out­comes. We have provided these ser­vices and achieved our object­ives while mak­ing our con­tri­bu­tion to the nation­al pri­or­it­ies and chal­lenges of address­ing the cli­mate and natures crises, build­ing a well-being eco­nomy, deliv­er­ing afford­able hous­ing and more.

We also con­tin­ued our work on the devel­op­ment phase of the Nation­al Lot­tery-fun­ded Cairngorms 2030 pro­gramme, along­side a wide range of part­ners. This devel­op­ment phase has now come to a close and we will find out in Decem­ber 2023 wheth­er we have been suc­cess­ful with our £43 mil­lion deliv­ery phase applic­a­tion. Cairngorms 2030 is all about the Nation­al Park becom­ing a rur­al exem­plar of work­ing with people to tackle big issues such as cli­mate mit­ig­a­tion and adap­tion, nature recov­ery, rur­al regen­er­a­tion, com­munity engage­ment and sus­tain­able transport.

There are plenty of high­lights from ²⁰²²⁄₂₃, from the cre­ation of new vis­it­or facil­it­ies to pine hov­er­fly rein­tro­duc­tion, afford­able hous­ing being delivered, and record amounts of peat­land being restored.

Scotland’s nation­al parks have nev­er been in a bet­ter place and, whilst future deliv­ery will be a chal­lenge giv­en the scale of the issues we face, I am excited by the task in hand. We’re for­tu­nate to have a com­mit­ted and tal­en­ted staff group, a know­ledge­able and con­nec­ted board and an unpar­alleled net­work of part­ners, land man­agers, char­it­ies, loc­al busi­nesses and com­munit­ies, all determ­ined to make the Cairngorms Nation­al Park the best it can be.

We are an organ­isa­tion that deliv­ers innov­a­tion, col­lab­or­a­tion and ambi­tion, and I am extremely proud to be its CEO.

Grant Moir Chief Exec­ut­ive and Account­able Officer 24 Novem­ber, 2023

1.3 The Park Authority

The Cairngorms Nation­al Park is the largest Nation­al Park in the United King­dom and cov­ers 4,525 square kilo­metres, twice the size of Loch Lomond and the Trossachs and 40% lar­ger than the Lake District.

The Park Author­ity is a Non-Depart­ment­al Pub­lic Body sponsored by the Envir­on­ment and Forestry Dir­ect­or­ate, Nat­ur­al Resources Divi­sion, Scot­tish Gov­ern­ment, estab­lished under the Nation­al Parks (Scot­land) Act 2000 with the pur­pose of being a mod­el of sus­tain­able devel­op­ment work­ing towards achiev­ing four stat­utory aims:

• to con­serve and enhance the nat­ur­al and cul­tur­al her­it­age of the area;
• to pro­mote sus­tain­able use of the nat­ur­al resources of the area;
• to pro­mote under­stand­ing and enjoy­ment (includ­ing enjoy­ment in the form of recre­ation) of the spe­cial qual­it­ies of the area by the pub­lic; and
• to pro­mote sus­tain­able eco­nom­ic and social devel­op­ment of the area’s communities.

Strategy and busi­ness model

The Park Author­ity has a key role in lead­ing the deliv­ery of the Cairngorms Nation­al Park Part­ner­ship Plan (NPPP). The Plan sets the con­text for close cooper­a­tion and part­ner­ship across pub­lic, private, and vol­un­tary organ­isa­tions in the Park, towards an agreed set of shared pri­or­ity object­ives. The Nation­al Park Part­ner­ship Plan sets out three long term out­comes for the Park and provides the over­all guide for stra­tegic align­ment between pub­lic agen­cies, private com­pan­ies and com­munity organ­isa­tions with­in the Park who are sig­nat­or­ies to, and part­ners in, deliv­ery of the Cairngorms NPPP.

Over the course of the last year the Park Author­ity has developed and extens­ively con­sul­ted on a new NPPP to span 2022 to 2027. This new NPPP was approved by the Park Authority’s board in June 2022 and by Scot­tish min­is­ters in August 2022.

The Park Authority’s Cor­por­ate Plan is derived from the NPPP. The Cor­por­ate Plan for the peri­od 2017 – 22 was approved by the Board and Scot­tish Min­is­ters in Spring 2018. Sub­sequently, the Author­ity has oper­ated against a trans­ition­al plan bridging the peri­od between the end of the 2017 – 22 NPPP and the com­mence­ment of the 2022 – 27 Plan. In the wider Scot­tish con­text, the Park Author­ity will also work on ensur­ing great­er stra­tegic align­ment to ensure deliv­ery of key nation­al strategies, such as cur­rent and future Pro­grammes for Gov­ern­ment and oth­er rel­ev­ant nation­al strategies.

Our stra­tegic work includes being an act­ive mem­ber of the Envir­on­ment and Eco­nomy Lead­ers’ Group, togeth­er with input to a range of nation­al lead­er­ship and stake­hold­er groups.

Our com­mit­ment

Our vis­ion, mis­sion state­ment and val­ues, are led by our board and staff and are cent­ral to our pur­pose and stra­tegic context:

Our vis­ion – an out­stand­ing Nation­al Park, enjoyed and val­ued by every­one, where nature and people thrive together.

Our mis­sion – to lead the way in deliv­er­ing for the Cairngorms Nation­al Park by bring­ing people togeth­er towards a com­mon pur­pose, enhan­cing the Park for every­one and inspir­ing new gen­er­a­tions to be Park Champions.

Our val­ues – the Park Author­ity is an open, inclus­ive, innov­at­ive, and pro­fes­sion­al organ­isa­tion that behaves with integ­rity. The Park Author­ity will also oper­ate in an envir­on­ment­ally friendly way that provides lead­er­ship in this area.

Our cul­ture – …to be the best small pub­lic body in Scotland.

We aspire to be the best small pub­lic body in Scot­land. Our staff sur­vey res­ults, under­taken every two years through ​“The Best Com­pan­ies Sur­vey”, have shown that we are a people-ori­ented organ­isa­tion per­form­ing well. We are lis­ted amongst the Top 100 Not for Profit Organ­isa­tions in the UK, and we are also recog­nised by Flex­ib­il­ity Works as one of the Top 10 employ­ers in Scot­land because of our approach to flex­ible work­ing for our staff group.

We will con­tin­ue to build on our Organ­isa­tion­al Devel­op­ment Strategy to imbed a high per­form­ance, high achiev­ing and high-qual­ity cul­ture based on an equal­it­ies and staff focused cul­ture. The Park Author­ity will con­tin­ue to be innov­at­ive and quick to act and will empower staff to deliv­er the strategies put in place by our Board.

1.4 Stra­tegic Aims and Pri­or­it­ies ²⁰²²⁄₂₃ and beyond

We con­trib­ute to deliv­ery of the long-term out­comes in the Cairngorms Nation­al Park Part­ner­ship Plan 2022 – 27 (NPPP) through work­ing to achieve our agreed Cor­por­ate Plan stra­tegic objectives.

Our stra­tegic aims and pri­or­it­ies are set out across the three themes of Nature and cli­mate, People, and Place. Each of these themes sets out a num­ber of pri­or­ity out­comes in line with the Cairngorms Nation­al Park Part­ner­ship Plan. Cor­por­ate Ser­vices and Com­mu­nic­a­tions sup­port the main themes and their out­comes. The Plan was approved by Scot­tish Min­is­ters in August 2022.

Nature – a car­bon neg­at­ive and biod­iversity rich Nation­al Park with bet­ter func­tion­ing, bet­ter con­nec­ted and more resi­li­ent ecosystems.

Out­comes:

1. Moor­land is more diverse,
2. Wood­land is expanding,
3. Peat­lands are restored,
4. Rivers are reconnected,
5. Spe­cies are recovering,
6. Farm­ing is car­bon neutral.

People – a well­being eco­nomy that works for all the people of the Cairngorms.

Out­comes:

1. Com­munit­ies are empowered,
2. Well­being comes first,
3. Green jobs are growing,
4. The Cairngorms is a Park for All,
5. Volun­teer­ing is on the rise,
6. Young people stay and thrive.

Place – a place that people want to live in, work in and vis­it that works for all.

Out­comes:

1. Hous­ing is more affordable,
2. Trans­port is more sustainable,
3. Com­munit­ies are connected,
4. Vis­it­or facil­it­ies are first class,
5. Cul­tur­al her­it­age is celebrated.

Sup­port themes

The deliv­ery of the themes and pri­or­it­ies is sup­por­ted by the Com­mu­nic­a­tions and Cor­por­ate Ser­vices teams. Our Com­mu­nic­a­tions team works with vis­it­ors, com­munit­ies, and stake­hold­ers to raise the pro­file of the Park and cre­ate a con­nec­tion and com­mit­ment to care for it. Our Cor­por­ate Ser­vices team ensures the deliv­ery of effect­ive, effi­cient, and sus­tain­able ser­vices in addi­tion to pro­mot­ing the highest stand­ards of gov­ernance, both with­in the Park Author­ity itself and also in work­ing with com­munity and vol­un­tary organ­isa­tions involved in deliv­ery of NPPP priorities.

Cor­por­ate services

The aim of the Cor­por­ate Ser­vices team is to deliv­er effect­ive, effi­cient, and sus­tain­able ser­vices, pro­mot­ing the highest stand­ards of gov­ernance to sup­port deliv­ery of the Cor­por­ate Plan and Cairngorms Nation­al Park Part­ner­ship Plan by the Park Author­ity and our com­munity and char­ity part­ners. We also play an act­ive role in the Envir­on­ment and Eco­nomy Lead­ers’ Group.

Pri­or­it­ies:

• Imple­ment the Organ­isa­tion­al Devel­op­ment Strategy and embed the organ­isa­tion­al and cul­tur­al improve­ments to make the Park author­ity the best small pub­lic body in Scotland.
• Ensure that our accom­mod­a­tion and its infra­struc­ture sup­port the deliv­ery of the Organ­isa­tion­al Devel­op­ment Strategy.
• Deliv­er ongo­ing ser­vice improve­ment, includ­ing appro­pri­ate shared ser­vices devel­op­ment and oper­a­tion, to the Park Author­ity, oth­er pub­lic bod­ies and the com­munity and char­it­able organ­isa­tions we support.
• Pro­mote and sup­port the highest stand­ards of gov­ernance and man­age­ment, includ­ing equal­it­ies actions, with­in the Park Author­ity, oth­er pub­lic bod­ies and the com­munity and char­it­able organ­isa­tions we support.

Com­mu­nic­a­tions and engagement

Com­mu­nic­at­ing with a wide range of stake­hold­ers – from loc­al res­id­ents to vis­it­ors, busi­nesses and land man­agers – is vital for the work of the Park Author­ity. It sup­ports the work being under­taken across the organ­isa­tion to deliv­er on the Nature and Cli­mate, People and Place pri­or­it­ies out­lined in our Nation­al Park Part­ner­ship Plan. Our role is to raise the pro­file of the Nation­al Park and cre­ate mean­ing­ful con­nec­tions between key audi­ences and the land­scape of the Cairngorms. We are seek­ing to build a com­munity of people who act­ively sup­port and care for the Nation­al Park and who bene­fit from doing so.

Pri­or­it­ies:

• Deliv­er the Com­mu­nic­a­tion and Engage­ment Strategy and increase aware­ness, engage­ment and involve­ment with the Nation­al Park.
• Coordin­ate engage­ment for our Cairngorms 2030 pro­gramme and tell the story as it pro­gresses, help­ing stake­hold­ers see their role in tack­ling the nature and cli­mate crises.
• Ensure high qual­ity intern­al com­mu­nic­a­tions that help deliv­er the key pri­or­it­ies of the Cor­por­ate Plan.
• Cel­eb­rate a diverse range of per­spect­ives and exper­i­ences in our com­mu­nic­a­tions, help­ing the Cairngorms become a ​‘Park for All’ where every­one is welcome.

1.5 Key Issues and Risks

Stra­tegic delivery

Deliv­ery of the Nation­al Park Part­ner­ship Plan will test the poten­tial for enhanced approaches to con­ser­va­tion and the pro­tec­tion of endangered spe­cies, includ­ing deliv­ery of out­comes on wild­life crime.

Fin­an­cial resources

The Scot­tish Government’s con­tin­ued and heightened con­cerns on for­ward sta­bil­ity of cur­rent fin­an­cial alloc­a­tions presents the risk of in-year adjust­ments, and uncer­tainty over future year fund­ing levels. The oppor­tun­ity to access UK Gov­ern­ment fund­ing to replace EU losses is unclear and the impact of wider changes to agri-envir­on­ment schemes also remains uncer­tain. Con­straints on pub­lic sec­tor fin­ances may restrict our capa­city to alloc­ate suf­fi­cient resources to deliv­er the cor­por­ate plan.

Human resources

Deliv­ery of extern­ally fun­ded pro­jects has become an intrins­ic part of our oper­a­tion­al plan­ning so that we main­tain the capa­city of the organ­isa­tion to achieve pro­ject out­comes, while work­ing in an increas­ingly com­pet­it­ive and restric­ted recruit­ment climate.

Tech­nic­al issues

The Author­ity recog­nises depend­ency on inform­a­tion tech­no­logy for effect­ive and effi­cient oper­a­tions. The incid­ence of cyber­crime increases the need for invest­ment in both secur­ity meas­ures and resourcing of IT ser­vices. Busi­ness con­tinu­ity plan­ning remains a focus.

1.6 Fin­an­cial Per­form­ance Summary

This sec­tion provides a sum­mary of the Park Authority’s fin­an­cial per­form­ance for the year against the Board approved budget and grant-in-aid awar­ded by the Scot­tish Government.

The Park Author­ity is expec­ted to man­age its budget in accord­ance with its Fin­an­cial Memor­andum and the Scot­tish Pub­lic Fin­ance Manu­als, and to deliv­er an out­turn for the fin­an­cial year with­in Scot­tish Government’s budget lim­its. The com­ment­ary and tables below show how the budgets agreed by the Board have been applied dur­ing the year with com­par­is­ons to pre­vi­ous years’ income and expenditure.

Income

The main source of our fund­ing for the year was grant-in-aid fund­ing from our spon­sor­ing body, the Envir­on­ment and Forestry Dir­ect­or­ate, Nat­ur­al Resources Divi­sion, of the Scot­tish Government.

We also acted as Account­able Body for the Nation­al Lot­tery Her­it­age Fund (NLHF) sup­port­ing sig­ni­fic­ant ongo­ing pro­jects: the deliv­ery phase of the Caper­cail­lie Frame­work and the devel­op­ment phase of the Cairngorms 2030 Pro­ject (Her­it­age Horizons).

The grant-in-aid set­tle­ment rep­res­ents an agreed budget with our spon­sor­ing depart­ment with an agreed level of fund­ing sup­port rep­res­ent­ing the Park Authority’s alloc­a­tions of Depart­ment­al Expendit­ure Lim­its (DEL) which cov­ers all expendit­ure net of income from all oth­er sources. DEL is fur­ther split between cash alloc­a­tions to meet oper­a­tion­al cost (resource or RDEL) and cap­it­al expendit­ure (cap­it­al or CDEL) and non-cash alloc­a­tions. The non-cash alloc­a­tion cov­ers depre­ci­ation and impair­ment of non-cur­rent assets, which are cap­it­al­ised tan­gible and intan­gible assets and now include, fol­low­ing the intro­duc­tion of IFRS 16, right-of-use assets (rent­al prop­er­ties, leased vehicles and leased office equip­ment) car­ried in the State­ment of Fin­an­cial Pos­i­tion at the year end.

The grant-in-aid set­tle­ment for ²⁰²²⁄₂₃ was again favour­able and increased in total by £1.671m with uplifts for both peat­land res­tor­a­tion, a cap­it­al increase of £0.806m (though an increase of £1.732m was ori­gin­ally offered and reflec­ted in the budget) and a cap­it­al increase of £0.178m for con­ser­va­tion, spe­cific­ally for nature biod­iversity and recov­ery. Fund­ing received in ²⁰²¹⁄₂₂ to reduce the impact of COVID19 on activ­it­ies with­in the Park (£0.5m) was not provided again in ²⁰²²⁄₂₃. How­ever, an addi­tion­al £0.5m was received to sup­port vis­it­or man­age­ment in the Park.

The fol­low­ing income and expendit­ure account provides a sum­mary of our actu­al fin­an­cial per­form­ance, cash, and non-cash, for the year against the final budget. This final budget equates to the ori­gin­al budget, presen­ted to the Board on 25^th March 2022, with the addi­tion of a £0.350m cap­it­al grant for nature recovery.

Income/​Expenditure	Out­turn (£’000)	Budget (£’000)	Vari­ance (£’000)
Income
Grant-in-aid Resource funding	7,472	7,472	-
Grant-in-aid Cap­it­al fund­ing general	600	600	-
Grant-in-aid Cap­it­al fund­ing peat­land recovery	2,214	2,962	(748)
Grant-in-aid Cap­it­al fund­ing nature recovery	350	350	-
Oth­er gen­er­ated income	898	182	716
Com­munity Led Loc­al Devel­op­ment (CLLD)	366	-	366
Cairngorms Caper­cail­lie project	474	915	(441)
Her­it­age Horizons	1,031	2,753	(1,722)
Total income	13,405	15,234	(1,829)
Expendit­ure
Staff and board costs	5,071	4,624	447
Run­ning costs	796	809	(13)
Oper­a­tion­al plan costs	2,818	2,834	(16)
Peat­land cap­it­al spend	1,945	2,962	(1,017)
Com­munity Led Loc­al Devel­op­ment (CLLD)	366	-	366
Nature Recov­ery cap­it­al spend	348	350	(2)
Cairngorms Caper­cail­lie project	474	915	(441)
Her­it­age Horizons	1,031	2,753	(1,722)
Total expendit­ure	12,849	15,247	(2,398)
Surplus/(deficit) on cash activities	556	(13)	569
Depre­ci­ation (non-cash)	321	-	321
Out­turn taken to Tax­pay­ers’ reserves	235	(13)	248

Over­all total income has grown by 158% in total since ²⁰¹⁹⁄₂₀, with grant-in-aid grow­ing by 214%.

Income from oper­a­tion­al plan activ­it­ies has con­sist­ently reduced over the peri­od, reflect­ing the change in emphas­is towards sig­ni­fic­ant ongo­ing pro­jects sup­por­ted by the Nation­al Lot­tery Her­it­age Fund, and the realign­ment of object­ives in this trans­ition­al year (before the next Park Part­ner­ship Plan) and towards Cairngorms 2030.

The LEAD­ER pro­gramme has been replaced by the Scot­tish Gov­ern­ment fun­ded Com­munity Led Loc­al Devel­op­ment (CLLD) pro­gramme, which com­menced dur­ing the year and the res­ults of which are included in oper­a­tion­al and oth­er gen­er­ated out­come totals.

Over­all, the increase in income is matched by an increase in expendit­ure, irre­spect­ive of source.

1.7 Oper­at­ing Per­form­ance Summary

As set out in the pre­lim­in­ary sec­tions of this report, the Park Author­ity has made sig­ni­fic­ant, pos­it­ive pro­gress in the real­isa­tion of our stra­tegic object­ives in this inter­im year between the four-year Cor­por­ate Plans for 2018 – 22 and 2023 – 2027.

The Park Authority’s Board receives quarterly updates from the Chief Exec­ut­ive on activ­it­ies and per­form­ance to sup­ple­ment the cor­por­ate per­form­ance reports linked above.

All quarterly update reports are pub­lished on our web­site to allow ongo­ing, open pub­lic aware­ness of the work of the Park Author­ity. We have dis­tilled the key high­lights and out­stand­ing issues in the deliv­ery of our stra­tegic aims in the fol­low­ing sec­tions of this Annu­al Report.

2 Account­ab­il­ity Report

The account­ab­il­ity report comprises:

• a state­ment on cor­por­ate gov­ernance, explain­ing the com­pos­i­tion and organ­isa­tion of the Authority’s gov­ernance struc­tures and how these sup­port the achieve­ment of our aims;
• a report on remu­ner­a­tion and staff­ing; and
• dis­clos­ures on mat­ters on which the Author­ity is account­able to Parliament.

2.1 Cor­por­ate Gov­ernance Report

2.1.1 Dir­ect­ors’ Report

The Dir­ect­ors’ Report sets out the key aspects of the intern­al organ­isa­tion­al change and devel­op­ment with­in the Park Author­ity dur­ing the year to 31 March 2023.

The Board

Board mem­bers who served through­out the year are lis­ted on page 2. Board mem­bers’ pro­files can be found at http://​cairngorms​.co​.uk/​a​u​t​h​o​r​i​t​y​/​b​oard/ where a link to mem­bers’ Register of Interests may also be found.

Fees paid to Board mem­bers are noted on page 59 togeth­er with the total amount of reim­bursed expenses paid in the year – these fig­ures are not sub­ject to audit. No pen­sion con­tri­bu­tions are made for any Board member.

The Seni­or Man­age­ment Team

The Chief Exec­ut­ive, who is also the Account­able Officer, is Grant Moir. The names of the Dir­ect­ors, who all served through­out the year, are lis­ted on pages 3 and 4.

Board Devel­op­ment and Governance

The Park Author­ity con­tin­ues to recog­nise the import­ance of train­ing and devel­op­ment to ensure that all staff and Board mem­bers have the skills required to deliv­er their role in the con­text of the organisation’s enabling and part­ner­ship eth­os. Appro­pri­ate Board train­ing and devel­op­ment pro­cesses sup­port the good gov­ernance arrange­ments set out in the Stand­ing Orders and Code of Conduct.

Fol­low­ing on from the achieve­ments made dur­ing ²⁰²¹⁄₂₂, the Board has con­tin­ued a pro­cess of self-eval­u­ation of effect­ive­ness and gov­ernance in order to ful­fil the Lead­er­ship aspir­a­tions set out in the first Organ­isa­tion­al Devel­op­ment Strategy (2015÷16).

Staff Devel­op­ment and Management

The stra­tegic policy for work­force man­age­ment bal­ances oper­a­tion­al needs against deliv­er­ing the max­im­um poten­tial flex­ib­il­ity in mak­ing budget pri­or­it­isa­tion decisions.

The Park Author­ity aspires to be ​“the best small pub­lic body In Scot­land” — to be innov­at­ive, quick to act and to empower staff to deliv­er the strategies that are put in place by the Board.

The Park Author­ity main­tains over­sight of its man­age­ment of sick­ness absence through reg­u­lar review of per­form­ance at Board and Man­age­ment team level.

Sus­tain­ab­il­ity report­ing and envir­on­ment­al matters

A key pur­pose of the Park Author­ity is to pro­mote part­ner­ship work­ing and give lead­er­ship to all the bod­ies and agen­cies involved in the sus­tain­able devel­op­ment of the Nation­al Park.

In 2019, the Park Author­ity ini­ti­ated the plan­ning pro­cess towards our becom­ing a net zero emis­sion organ­isa­tion by 2045 and achiev­ing the even more chal­len­ging object­ive of real­ising a 75% reduc­tion in our emis­sions by 2030, through our Board’s con­sid­er­a­tion of the ​“Net Zero with Nature” paper (Decem­ber 2019).

Social, com­munity and human rights issues

Our work on sus­tain­ab­il­ity and the envir­on­ment is also cent­ral to our activ­it­ies around social and com­munity development.

Diversity

The Cairngorms Nation­al Park Author­ity is com­mit­ted to pro­mot­ing equal­ity both as an employ­er and through the work it does.

Gender Pay Gap

The Gender pay gap for ²⁰²²⁄₂₃ was 9.55%, which is lower than the most recently repor­ted pay gap for Scot­land (10.1% 2021).

LGBT Charter and Action Plan

The Park Author­ity signed up to the LGBT Charter dur­ing ²⁰²¹⁄₂₂.

Intern­al Equal­ity Group

The Park Author­ity developed an Intern­al Equal­ity, Diversity, and Inclu­sion Advocacy Group in winter 2021.

Extern­al Equal­ity Advis­ory Pan­el (EAP)

The EAP has gone from strength to strength since it was estab­lished in Septem­ber 2020.

Alzheimer Centre

Alzheimer Scotland’s first Out­door Demen­tia Resource Centre, at Bad­aguish Out­door Centre near Aviemore, opened in April 2023.

Nation­al Park Part­ner­ship Plan Con­sulta­tion Process.

The new Nation­al Park Part­ner­ship Plan was form­ally approved by our Board in June 2022, fol­low­ing an extens­ive con­sulta­tion period.

Inclus­ive Imagery

Fol­low­ing feed­back from the Equal­ity Advis­ory pan­el that imagery on our social media and print chan­nels was lim­ited, we have com­mis­sioned over 1,000 people-based images over the past year.

Volun­teer Cairngorms

Volun­teer Cairngorms has partnered with Home Start East High­land, the Rape and Sexu­al Viol­ence Centre in Perth and Kinross, and Search­light Asylum Seekers.

Scot­In­form Com­munity Engage­ment Report

The Park Author­ity com­mis­sioned a review of the com­munity engage­ment work under­taken across the Nation­al Park in the last five years.

Cairngorms Nature Festival

The Nature Fest­iv­al was on-line in 2021 and in-per­son over a week­end in 2022.

Cairngorms Green Recov­ery Fund

This was made avail­able through a part­ner­ship between the Park Author­ity and The Cairngorms Trust with the aim of sup­port­ing the recov­ery of the eco­nomy of the Cairngorms from the wide­spread impacts of COVID-19.

Engage­ment around the loc­al elec­tions of board members

We imple­men­ted a num­ber of innov­at­ive activ­it­ies to encour­age people to put them­selves for­ward for the loc­al elec­tions to the Board of the Park Authority.

Inform­a­tion and data security

The Authority’s cur­rent IT and Data Man­age­ment Strategy estab­lishes the vis­ion and dir­ec­tion for our invest­ment and work in this area.

2.1.2 State­ment of Nation­al Park Authority’s Responsibilities

Under sec­tion 25(1) of the Nation­al Parks (Scot­land) Act 2000, the Cairngorms Nation­al Park Author­ity is required to keep prop­er accounts and account­ing records, pre­pare an account of its expendit­ure and receipts for each fin­an­cial year in accord­ance with dir­ec­tions issued by the Scot­tish Min­is­ters, and send the account to the Scot­tish Min­is­ters by such time as they may direct.

The fin­an­cial state­ments are to be pre­pared on the accru­als basis and must give a true and fair view of its expendit­ure and cash flow for the fin­an­cial year, and of the state of affairs as at the end of the fin­an­cial year.

Aud­it­ors

The accounts of the Park Author­ity are audited by Maz­ars LLP who are appoin­ted by the Aud­it­or Gen­er­al for Scot­land in accord­ance with para­graph 25(2) of the Nation­al Parks (Scot­land) Act 2000.

2.1.3 State­ment of Board’s Responsibilities

The Board has a cor­por­ate respons­ib­il­ity for ensur­ing that the Park Author­ity ful­fils the aims and object­ives set by the Scot­tish Min­is­ters and for pro­mot­ing the eco­nom­ic, effi­cient, and effect­ive use of staff and oth­er resources in accord­ance with the prin­ciples of Best Value.

The Con­vener of the Board

The Con­vener is respons­ible to Scot­tish Min­is­ters and is charged with ensur­ing that the Park Authority’s policies and actions sup­port the wider stra­tegic policies of the Scot­tish Min­is­ters, and that the Park Authority’s affairs are con­duc­ted with probity.

The Con­vener also ensures that all Board Mem­bers, when tak­ing up office, are fully briefed on the terms of their duties, rights, and responsibilities.

2.1.4 State­ment of the Account­able Officer’s Responsibilities

As Chief Exec­ut­ive of the Park Author­ity I am des­ig­nated the Account­able Officer and am per­son­ally respons­ible for safe­guard­ing the pub­lic funds for which I have sole charge.

Dis­clos­ure of Inform­a­tion to Aud­it­ors by the Account­able Officer

So far as I am aware, there is no rel­ev­ant audit inform­a­tion of which the Park Authority’s aud­it­ors are unaware and I have taken all reas­on­able steps to make myself aware of any rel­ev­ant audit inform­a­tion and to estab­lish that the aud­it­ors are aware of that information.

Account­able Officer’s state­ment on the Annu­al Accounts

As Account­able Officer I believe that the annu­al report and accounts as a whole are fair, bal­anced and understandable.

2.2 Gov­ernance Statement

Scope of responsibility

As Account­able Officer, I am respons­ible for main­tain­ing sound sys­tems of intern­al con­trol that sup­port the achieve­ment of Cairngorms Nation­al Park Authority’s policies, aims and objectives.

The Man­age­ment State­ment estab­lished by Scot­tish Gov­ern­ment sets out the role of the Park Authority’s Board in provid­ing lead­er­ship and governance.

As a pub­lic body, the Park Author­ity is com­mit­ted to access­ib­il­ity, open­ness and account­ab­il­ity, and sup­ports the highest stand­ards in cor­por­ate governance.

The Board com­prises 19 mem­bers: 7 appoin­ted by Min­is­ters fol­low­ing nom­in­a­tion by five Coun­cils, 7 appoin­ted by Scot­tish Gov­ern­ment, and 5 dir­ectly elected.

To ensure that the Board devel­ops an under­stand­ing of the cur­rent and emer­ging issues, mem­bers also par­ti­cip­ate in inform­al dis­cus­sion sessions.

The Board has estab­lished sub-com­mit­tees: a Plan­ning Com­mit­tee, togeth­er with Com­mit­tees cov­er­ing Gov­ernance, Resources, Per­form­ance, and Audit and Risk.

The Audit and Risk Committee

The role of the Audit and Risk Com­mit­tee is to provide effect­ive gov­ernance over all aspects of the Park Authority’s intern­al man­age­ment con­trol sys­tems and the annu­al fin­an­cial accounts and audit.

The Board has con­tin­ued a pro­cess of self-eval­u­ation of effect­ive­ness and governance.

Shared ser­vices delivery

The Park Author­ity plays an import­ant role in provid­ing sup­port over a range of activ­it­ies to loc­al com­munit­ies and organ­isa­tions to help deliv­er the Nation­al Park Part­ner­ship Plan’s priorities.

The Author­ity also under­takes a range of shared ser­vice arrange­ments with oth­er pub­lic body partners.

Intern­al audit

The intern­al audit func­tion is an integ­ral ele­ment of scru­tiny of the Park Authority’s intern­al con­trol systems.

Extern­al audit

Extern­al aud­it­ors are appoin­ted for us by the Aud­it­or Gen­er­al for Scot­land through Audit Scotland.

Best value

The Audit and Risk Com­mit­tee con­tin­ues to mon­it­or the Authority’s adher­ence to Scot­tish Gov­ern­ment Best Value guidelines and our approach to con­tinu­ous improvement.

Risk man­age­ment

We have a risk man­age­ment strategy in accord­ance with guid­ance issued by Scot­tish Min­is­ters to identi­fy actu­al and poten­tial threats.

2.3 Remu­ner­a­tion and staff report

The Remu­ner­a­tion and Staff Report sets out the Authority’s remu­ner­a­tion policy for dir­ect­ors, reports on how the policy has been imple­men­ted and sets out the amounts awar­ded to directors.

Pay policy

The fees and expenses paid to Board mem­bers com­ply with guid­ance issued by Scot­tish Min­is­ters, the Pub­lic Sec­tor Pay Policy for Seni­or Appointments.

Staff salary levels, includ­ing the Chief Exec­ut­ive, are reviewed by the Resources Committee.

Mem­bers of staff covered by this report hold appoint­ments that are either open ended or fixed term.

Per­form­ance and human cap­it­al management

Per­form­ance of all staff mem­bers is mon­itored and reviewed through the staff apprais­al arrangements.

Staff­ing and recruitment

The Park Author­ity has a Resource Com­mit­tee, com­pris­ing sev­en Board mem­bers sup­por­ted by rel­ev­ant seni­or staff.

Staff involve­ment

The Park Author­ity has a Staff Con­sultat­ive For­um (SCF) in place.

Equal­ity and diversity

The Park Author­ity is an equal oppor­tun­it­ies employ­er with policies against discrimination.

2.4 Par­lia­ment­ary account­ab­il­ity disclosures

Cairngorms Nation­al Park Author­ity is held to account by the Scot­tish Min­is­ters, in accord­ance with the require­ments of The Nation­al Parks (Scot­land) Act 2000.

Fees and charges

Dur­ing the year, the Park Author­ity received 60% of plan­ning fees for called in plan­ning applications.

Losses and spe­cial payments

Dur­ing the year a cyber fraud res­ul­ted in the loss of £15,665.

Gifts

Gifts totalling £391 were made to Board mem­bers leav­ing dur­ing the year.

Sig­ni­fic­ant remote contingencies

The Park Author­ity is not aware of any liab­il­it­ies for which the like­li­hood of a trans­fer of eco­nom­ic bene­fit in set­tle­ment is too remote to meet the defin­i­tion of a con­tin­gent liability.

2.5 Inde­pend­ent auditor’s report to the mem­bers of Cairngorms Nation­al Park Author­ity, the Aud­it­or Gen­er­al for Scot­land and the Scot­tish Parliament

Report on the audit of the fin­an­cial statements

Opin­ion on the fin­an­cial statements

We have audited the fin­an­cial state­ments in the annu­al report and accounts of Cairngorms Nation­al Park Author­ity for the year ended 31 March 2023 under the Nation­al Parks (Scot­land) Act 2000.

In our opin­ion the accom­pa­ny­ing fin­an­cial statements:

• give a true and fair view of the state of the body’s affairs as at 31 March 2023 and of its net expendit­ure for the year then ended;
• have been prop­erly pre­pared in accord­ance with UK adop­ted inter­na­tion­al account­ing stand­ards; and
• have been pre­pared in accord­ance with the require­ments of the Nation­al Parks (Scot­land) Act 2000 and dir­ec­tions made there­un­der by the Scot­tish Ministers.

Basis for opinion

We con­duc­ted our audit in accord­ance with applic­able law and Inter­na­tion­al Stand­ards on Audit­ing (UK) (ISAs (UK)).

Con­clu­sions relat­ing to going con­cern basis of accounting

We have con­cluded that the use of the going con­cern basis of account­ing in the pre­par­a­tion of the fin­an­cial state­ments is appropriate.

Risks of mater­i­al misstatement

We report in our sep­ar­ate Annu­al Audit