231124BdPaper3FireManagementByelaws

Form­al Board Paper 3 24 Novem­ber 2023 Page 1 of 16

For decision

Title: Fire Man­age­ment Byelaws – Pro­posed Consultation

Pre­pared by: Grant Moir, CEO

Pur­pose

Fire risk is increas­ing in Scot­land with cli­mate mod­el­ling show­ing a pre­dicted increase in drought peri­ods. Wild­fire risk has been increas­ing in the Park and there is a need to con­sider all poten­tial solu­tions to redu­cing risk. There is a need to pro­tect people, nature and property.

Mem­bers are now invited to agree an approach to a pub­lic con­sulta­tion on wheth­er to take for­ward a fire man­age­ment byelaw for the Cairngorms Nation­al Park and what that fire man­age­ment byelaw should include or cov­er. It builds on the dis­cus­sion at the last Board meet­ing in September.

If the Board agree to pro­ceed with this con­sulta­tion, then the res­ults will be taken back to the Board with a recom­mend­a­tion on the next steps in mid-2024.

Recom­mend­a­tions

The Board is asked to: a) Agree to pro­ceed to a pub­lic con­sulta­tion based on three options as out­lined in this paper, start­ing in Janu­ary 2024 for 8 weeks.

Stra­tegic context

1. At the meet­ing of the Park Author­ity Board on the 8 Septem­ber it was agreed by the Board that a ​‘paper on poten­tial bylaw imple­ment­a­tion across the Park be presen­ted to a future meet­ing of the board’.

2. The chan­ging cli­mate will make wild­fire risk con­sid­er­ably high­er in the future. This year there has already been a num­ber of incid­ents in the Nation­al Park and there have been large wild­fires just out­side the Park at Dav­i­ot and Can­nich in the

Form­al Board Paper 3 24 Novem­ber 2023 Page 2 of 16

High­lands. The Park Author­ity has also received mul­tiple expres­sions of com­munity and land man­ager con­cern about this issue.

1. The Park Author­ity has already com­mit­ted in the Nation­al Park Part­ner­ship Plan (NPPP) to estab­lish an Integ­rated Wild­fire Man­age­ment Plan (IWMP) for the Park. Pre­par­a­tion of this plan will be led by the Land Man­age­ment team with­in Cairngorms Nation­al Park Author­ity and work has already star­ted. The pur­pose of the IWMP is to increase the abil­ity of land man­agers across the Park to:

a) min­im­ise the risk of wild­fires start­ing. b) respond effect­ively to wild­fires that do start. c) reduce the impact of any wild­fires in a chan­ging landscape.

1. The IWMP will be developed in par­al­lel with any pro­pos­als for byelaws. It is hoped that the IWMP will be in place for late sum­mer 2024.

Stra­tegic policy consideration

1. The Cairngorms Nation­al Park is home to 19,000 people and vis­ited by around 2 mil­lion people each year. It is home to 25% of the rare and endangered spe­cies and the Cairngorms has over half of Scotland’s semi-nat­ur­al pine wood­land. A large wild­fire in the Cairngorms could be an eco­lo­gic­al dis­aster and could impact sig­ni­fic­antly on people’s prop­erty and livelihoods.

2. Wild­fires can start in a num­ber of dif­fer­ent ways, includ­ing from nat­ur­al causes (e.g. light­ning), vis­it­ors light­ing fires (e.g. for cook­ing or recre­ation) which get out of con­trol or from muir­burn that gets out of control.

3. Scot­tish Fire and Res­cue Ser­vice (SFRS) have iden­ti­fied resource and oper­a­tion­al man­age­ment issues around the approach to wild­fire man­age­ment in Scot­land. This was high­lighted in their response to the Crim­in­al Justice Com­mit­tee in Septem­ber 20231.

1 Response 187996251 to Crim­in­al Justice Pre-Budget scru­tiny: 2024 – 25 — Scot­tish Par­lia­ment — Cit­izen Space

Form­al Board Paper 3 24 Novem­ber 2023 Page 3 of 16

1. The issues sur­round­ing muir­burn are cur­rently being addressed through the Wild­life Man­age­ment and Muir­burn (Scot­land) Bill which, if it passes, will require land man­agers to get a licence to under­take muir­burn at any point in the year. The need, at present, is there­fore for any new form of reg­u­la­tion in the Park to focus mainly on issues to do with vis­it­ors light­ing fires.

2. The Scot­tish Out­door Access Code cur­rently states that ​“Wherever pos­sible, use a stove rather than light an open fire. If you do wish to light an open fire, keep it small, under con­trol, and super­vised — fires that get out of con­trol can cause major dam­age, for which you might be liable. Nev­er light an open fire dur­ing pro­longed dry peri­ods or in areas such as forests, woods, farm­land or on peaty ground or near to build­ings or in cul­tur­al her­it­age sites where dam­age can be eas­ily caused. Heed all advice at times of high risk. Remove all traces of an open fire before you leave.”

3. The Civic Gov­ern­ment (Scot­land) Act 1982 (Sec­tion 56) also states that ​“Any per­son who lays or lights a fire in a pub­lic place so as to endanger any oth­er per­son or give him reas­on­able cause for alarm or annoy­ance, or so as to endanger any prop­erty, shall be guilty of an offence”

4. The Park Author­ity Ranger Ser­vice has col­lec­ted com­pre­hens­ive stat­ist­ics for live fires and fire remains over the past 3 years. Appendix 1 sets out the stat­ist­ics and heat maps for 2023. In 2023 there were 219 act­ive fires dealt with by the Park Author­ity Rangers and 678 fire remain sites dealt with.

5. The Park Author­ity has also asked for the num­ber of call outs to wild­fires from SFRS. This data is not Park-spe­cif­ic but shows the levels of call-outs that SFRS have had to attend in areas that cov­er the Nation­al Park.

SFRS Wild­fire Attendance

	2020	2021	2022
Aber­deen­shire and Moray	17	5	22
High­lands	22	54	49

1. There have also been sig­ni­fic­ant com­mu­nic­a­tion cam­paigns run nation­ally and with­in the Nation­al Park to high­light the issues around fires as covered in the paper in Septem­ber 2023.

Form­al Board Paper 3 24 Novem­ber 2023 Page 4 of 16

Byelaw Options

1. This sec­tion sets out the three options that the Park Author­ity will con­sult on in Janu­ary 2024 if approved. In the con­sulta­tion the pros and cons of each of the options will be set out more fully. Appendix 2 & 3 sets out the word­ing for options 1 & 2 set out below and will be the basis for the con­sulta­tion on those options.

Option 1 – Year Round Fire Man­age­ment Byelaw

1. This option is the simplest to com­mu­nic­ate with a con­sist­ent approach through­out the year but is not dir­ectly linked to a wild­fire risk-based approach. If imple­men­ted it would mean that, even at times of lower fire risk it would not be pos­sible to have a fire in the Nation­al Park. There would need to be a sig­ni­fic­ant com­mu­nic­a­tion cam­paign in advance of intro­duc­tion and the Park Author­ity would need to look at appro­pri­ate sig­nage with­in the Park and on all materials.

Option 2 – Time Lim­ited Fire Man­age­ment Byelaws

1. This option is framed so that it would only apply at times of high fire risk and is more per­missive of fire at oth­er times. It would be sig­ni­fic­antly more com­plic­ated to com­mu­nic­ate and requires peri­ods of high fire risk to be agreed and com­mu­nic­ated when they start and fin­ish. It is how­ever the approach most closely aligned with a wild­fire linked risk-based approach. Dif­fer­ent areas of the Park may also be covered by dif­fer­ent fire risks. A sig­ni­fic­ant com­mu­nic­a­tions cam­paign would be needed to let people know when the byelaw applied.

Option 3 – No Byelaw

1. This approach would involve the least change and car­ry­ing on as at present but with increased com­mu­nic­a­tion and edu­ca­tion with the intent that this will lead to a reduc­tion in fire incid­ents and the risk of wild­fire in the Nation­al Park. The Park Author­ity and oth­er part­ners would con­tin­ue to com­mu­nic­ate fire mes­sages through Rangers and through our media cam­paigns and would speak to people on the ground and remove traces of old fires. We would con­tin­ue to work with land man­agers, Police Scot­land and SFRS. As part of this the Park Author­ity would con­tin­ue to look at the abil­ity to sim­pli­fy the mes­sage in SOAC to be more practical.

Form­al Board Paper 3 24 Novem­ber 2023 Page 5 of 16

Enforce­ment

1. If byelaws are taken for­ward every ranger employed by the Nation­al Park Author­ity would be empowered to enforce the byelaws. This will mean ensur­ing train­ing and pre­par­a­tion in advance of any byelaws com­ing into force. There will also need to be a con­sid­er­a­tion of wheth­er the cur­rent resource base is adequate to ensure that there is a threat of enforce­ment in the Park.

Times­cale and Next Steps

1. It is pro­posed to go to con­sulta­tion in Janu­ary 2024 on the options for 8 weeks. Fol­low­ing the con­sulta­tion, a paper with the con­sulta­tion res­ults and a recom­mend­a­tion will be taken to the Board in mid-2024. If it is agreed by the Board to pro­ceed with a byelaw it will be form­ally con­sul­ted on as per the pro­cess set out in Appendix 4. Scot­tish Min­is­ters require to con­firm the bylaw and the earli­est a byelaw could come into oper­a­tion would be in 2025.

Form­al Board Paper 3 24 Novem­ber 2023 Page 6 of 16

Appendix 1 – Fire Stat­ist­ics col­lec­ted by Park Author­ity Ranger Service

Form­al Board Paper 3 24 Novem­ber 2023 Page 7 of 16

Form­al Board Paper 3 24 Novem­ber 2023 Appendix 2 – Option 1: Year-Round Fire Man­age­ment Byelaw Page 8 of 16

Gen­er­al The Cairngorms Nation­al Park Author­ity, con­sti­tuted under the Nation­al Parks (Scot­land) Act 2000 and the Cairngorms Nation­al Park Des­ig­na­tion, Trans­ition­al and Con­sequen­tial Pro­vi­sions (Scot­land) Order 2003, and hav­ing its prin­cip­al offices at 14 The Square, Grant­own-on-Spey, Moray, PH26 3HG(“the Author­ity”), in exer­cise of the powers con­ferred upon it by Para­graph 8 of Sched­ule 2 to the Nation­al Parks (Scot­land) Act 2000 hereby makes the fol­low­ing byelaws:

Cita­tion and Applic­a­tion (1) These byelaws may be cited as The Cairngorms Nation­al Park Fire Man­age­ment Byelaws 20XX. (2) These byelaws shall apply between the dates of 1 Janu­ary and 31 Decem­ber in each cal­en­dar year (both dates inclus­ive) with­in the Cairngorms Nation­al Park (“the Nation­al Park”)

Defin­i­tions and Inter­pret­a­tions (3) In these byelaws, the fol­low­ing words, phrases and expres­sions are prin­ted in bold wherever they appear and they have the inter­pret­a­tion and mean­ing hereby assigned to them, respect­ively: a) ​“avoid­able dam­age” means any dam­age res­ult­ing from fire where that fire that has not been prop­erly planned, con­trolled and/​or man­aged in recog­ni­tion of the loc­al ground ter­rain, veget­a­tion, access­ib­il­ity and weath­er con­di­tions between the time of igni­tion to when the fire is fully extin­guished; b) ​“bar­be­cue” means an appli­ance or rack on which food is cooked out of doors over an open fire and shall include a dis­pos­able, gas and coal port­able bar­be­cue wheth­er man­u­fac­tured as such or oth­er­wise; c) ​“bothy” means a build­ing of no more than two storeys which- ii. i. does not have any form of mains elec­tri­city, piped fuel sup­ply, and piped mains water sup­ply; and is 100 metres or more from the nearest pub­lic road (with­in the mean­ing of sec­tion 151 of the Roads (Scot­land) Act 1984); and iii. is 100 metres or more from the nearest hab­it­able building;

Fire (4) Form­al Board Paper 3 24 Novem­ber 2023 Page 9 of 16

d) ​“cur­til­age” means land which is used for the com­fort­able enjoy­ment of a build­ing and which serves the pur­pose of that build­ing in some neces­sary or reas­on­ably use­ful way; e) ​“dwell­ing­house” means a res­id­en­tial prop­erty, includ­ing a build­ing con­tain­ing one or more flats, or a flat con­tained with­in such a build­ing; f) ​“fire­place” means a struc­ture that is designed to con­tain a fire and is made of brick, stone, met­al or any oth­er mater­i­al; g) ​“land man­ager” means (i) a landown­er, ten­ant or part­ner law­fully author­ised by or on behalf of such landown­er or ten­ant to man­age land with­in the Nation­al Park; and (ii) or in the case of a landown­er, ten­ant or oth­er per­son that is a body cor­por­ate or unin­cor­por­ated body, any indi­vidu­al who has the power to con­trol the affairs of that body, by whatever means; h) ​“landown­er” means the own­er of any land or build­ing with­in or con­nec­ted to the Nation­al Park; i) ​“licensed” means hold­ing a val­id licence issued under the Cara­van Sites and Con­trol of Devel­op­ment Act 1960; j) ​“muir­burn licence” means any stat­utory licence issued by the Scot­tish Min­sters or their nom­in­ees in rela­tion to mak­ing muir­burn; k) ​“occu­pi­er” means any per­son who is occupy­ing a dwell­ing­house or prop­erty with the con­sent of the landown­er; 1) ​“part­ner” means a sport­ing part­ner engaged in the man­age­ment of any land with­in the Nation­al Park; m) ​“prop­erty” includes both land and built infra­struc­ture; n) ​“SFRS” means the Scot­tish Fire and Res­cue Ser­vice estab­lished in terms of the Fire (Scot­land) Act 2005 and its stat­utory suc­cessors; o) ​“ten­ant” means the ten­ant of any land with­in the Nation­al Park leased or let to such ten­ant under a lease of one year or more;

It shall be an offence under these byelaws for any per­son without law­ful author­ity to light a fire in the Nation­al Park, or place or throw or let fall a lighted match, fire­work or any oth­er thing so as to be likely to cause a fire, unless the fire is wholly con­tained: a) with­in the cur­til­age of a private dwell­ing­house and is under the con­trol of the landown­er, ten­ant or occu­pi­er of the dwell­ing­house so as to safe­guard against dam­age or danger to any per­son, wild­life, build­ing, struc­ture, tree, shrub or veget­a­tion; b) in a fire­place in a bothy so as to safe­guard against dam­age or danger to any per­son, wild­life, build­ing, struc­ture, tree, shrub or veget­a­tion; or

Form­al Board Paper 3 24 Novem­ber 2023 Page 10 of 16

c) in a licensed cara­van site so as to safe­guard against dam­age or danger to any per­son, wild­life, build­ing, struc­ture, tree, shrub or veget­a­tion, has per­mis­sion from the own­er of the site and is not tak­ing place dur­ing a time of high fire risk as determ­ined by SFRS; or d) with­in private prop­erty, is under the con­trol or the landown­er, ten­ant or occu­pi­er of the prop­erty so as to safe­guard against dam­age or danger to any per­son, wild­life, build­ing, struc­ture, tree, shrub or veget­a­tion and has the con­sent of the landown­er, such con­sent hav­ing been noti­fied in advance to the Author­ity, and is not tak­ing place dur­ing a time of high fire risk as determ­ined by SFRS.

This byelaw shall not pre­vent the use of a camp­ing stove man­u­fac­tured as a camp­ing stove or cook­er, provided it is used in such a man­ner as not to cause danger of, or dam­age by, fire.

Bar­be­cues (5) It shall be an offence under these byelaws for any per­son without law­ful author­ity to light or use a bar­be­cue any­where in the Nation­al Park unless the bar­be­cue is wholly con­tained; a) with­in the cur­til­age of a private dwell­ing­house and is under the con­trol of the landown­er ten­ant or occu­pi­er of the dwell­ing­house so as to safe­guard against dam­age or danger to any per­son, wild­life, build­ing, struc­ture, tree, shrub or veget­a­tion; or b) in a licensed cara­van site so as to safe­guard against dam­age or danger to any per­son, wild­life, build­ing, struc­ture, tree, shrub or veget­a­tion, has per­mis­sion from the own­er of the site and is not tak­ing place dur­ing a time of high fire risk as determ­ined by SFRS; or c) with­in private prop­erty, is under the con­trol or the landown­er, ten­ant or occu­pi­er of the prop­erty so as to safe­guard against dam­age or danger to any per­son, wild­life, build­ing, struc­ture, tree, shrub or veget­a­tion and has the con­sent of the landown­er, such con­sent hav­ing been noti­fied in advance to the Author­ity, and is not tak­ing place dur­ing a time of high fire risk as determ­ined by SFRS

Muir­burn (6) It shall be an offence under these byelaws: a) for any per­son oth­er than a land man­ager to make muir­burn; and b) for a land man­ager to make muir­burn, oth­er­wise than in accord­ance with a muir­burn licence gran­ted by the Scot­tish Min­is­ters; and c) for a land man­ager to make muir­burn dur­ing a time of high fire risk as determ­ined by SFRS.

Pro­vi­sion of details (7) Form­al Board Paper 3 24 Novem­ber 2023 Page 11 of 16

It shall be an offence under these byelaws for any per­son to refuse to provide their full name and address to any per­son author­ised in writ­ing by the Author­ity who has reas­on­able grounds for believ­ing that such per­son has com­mit­ted an offence under these byelaws.

Pen­al­ties and Offences (8) (9) No per­son shall obstruct any per­son author­ised in writ­ing by the Author­ity in the exe­cu­tion of their duties in rela­tion to these byelaws. Any per­son who con­tra­venes any of the fore­go­ing byelaws shall be guilty of an offence and shall be liable on sum­mary con­vic­tion to a fine not exceed­ing Level 2 on the Stand­ard Scale in respect of each offence. END

Form­al Board Paper 3 24 Novem­ber 2023 Appendix 3 – Option 2: High Fire Risk Byelaw Page 12 of 16

Gen­er­al The Cairngorms Nation­al Park Author­ity, con­sti­tuted under the Nation­al Parks (Scot­land) Act 2000 and the Cairngorms Nation­al Park Des­ig­na­tion, Trans­ition­al and Con­sequen­tial Pro­vi­sions (Scot­land) Order 2003, and hav­ing its prin­cip­al offices at 14 The Square, Grant­own-on-Spey, Moray, PH26 3HG(“the Author­ity”), in exer­cise of the powers con­ferred upon it by Para­graph 8 of Sched­ule 2 to the Nation­al Parks (Scot­land) Act 2000 hereby makes the fol­low­ing byelaws:

Cita­tion and Applic­a­tion (1) These byelaws may be cited as The Cairngorms Nation­al Park Fire Man­age­ment Byelaws 20XX. (2) These byelaws shall apply only at times of high fire risk as determ­ined by SFRS.

Defin­i­tions and Inter­pret­a­tions (3) In these byelaws, the fol­low­ing words, phrases and expres­sions are prin­ted in bold wherever they appear and they have the inter­pret­a­tion and mean­ing hereby assigned to them, respect­ively: a) ​“bar­be­cue” means an appli­ance or rack on which food is cooked out of doors over an open fire and shall include a dis­pos­able, gas and coal port­able bar­be­cue wheth­er man­u­fac­tured as such or oth­er­wise; b) ​“bothy” means a build­ing of no more than two storeys which- i. does not have any form of mains elec­tri­city, piped fuel sup­ply, and piped mains water sup­ply; ii. is 100 metres or more from the nearest pub­lic road (with­in the mean­ing of sec­tion 151 of the Roads (Scot­land) Act 1984); and iii. is 100 metres or more from the nearest hab­it­able build­ing; c) ​“cur­til­age” means land which is used for the com­fort­able enjoy­ment of a build­ing and which serves the pur­pose of that build­ing in some neces­sary or reas­on­ably use­ful way; d) ​“dwell­ing­house” means a res­id­en­tial prop­erty, includ­ing a build­ing con­tain­ing one or more flats, or a flat con­tained with­in such a build­ing; e) ​“fire­place” means a struc­ture that is designed to con­tain a fire and is made of brick, stone, met­al or any oth­er mater­i­al; f) landown­er” means the own­er of any land or build­ing with­in or con­nec­ted to the Nation­al Park;

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g) ​“licensed” means hold­ing a val­id licence issued under the Cara­van Sites and Con­trol of Devel­op­ment Act 1960; h) ​“occu­pi­er” means any per­son who is occupy­ing a dwell­ing­house or prop­erty with the con­sent of the landown­er; i) j) Fire (4) ​“prop­erty” includes both land and built infra­struc­ture; ​“SFRS” means the Scot­tish Fire and Res­cue Ser­vice estab­lished in terms of the Fire (Scot­land) Act 2005 and its stat­utory suc­cessors; k) ​“ten­ant” means the ten­ant of any land with­in the Nation­al Park leased or let to such ten­ant under a lease of one year or more;

It shall be an offence under these byelaws for any per­son without law­ful author­ity to light a fire in the Nation­al Park, or place or throw or let fall a lighted match, fire­work or any oth­er thing so as to be likely to cause a fire unless the fire is wholly con­tained: a) with­in the cur­til­age of a private prop­erty and is under the con­trol of the landown­er, ten­ant or occu­pi­er of the prop­erty so as to safe­guard against dam­age or danger to any per­son, wild­life, build­ing, struc­ture, tree, shrub or veget­a­tion; or b) in a fire­place con­nec­ted with a bothy so as to safe­guard against dam­age or danger to any per­son, wild­life, build­ing, struc­ture, tree, shrub or vegetation.

This byelaw shall not pre­vent the use of a camp­ing stove man­u­fac­tured as a camp­ing stove or cook­er, provided it is used in such a man­ner as not to cause danger of or dam­age by fire.

Bar­be­cues (5) It shall be an offence under these byelaws for any per­son without law­ful author­ity to light or use a bar­be­cue any­where in the Nation­al Park unless the bar­be­cue is wholly con­tained with­in the cur­til­age of a private dwell­ing­house and is under the con­trol of the landown­er, ten­ant or occu­pi­er of the dwell­ing­house, so as to safe­guard against dam­age or danger to any per­son, wild­life, build­ing, struc­ture, tree, shrub or vegetation.

Muir­burn (6) It shall be an offence under these byelaws for any per­son to make muirburn.

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Pro­vi­sion of details (7) It shall be an offence under these byelaws for any per­son to refuse to provide their full name and address to an officer of the Author­ity, a police officer or any oth­er per­son author­ised in writ­ing by the Author­ity who has reas­on­able grounds for believ­ing that such per­son has com­mit­ted an offence under these byelaws.

Pen­al­ties and Offences (8) No per­son shall obstruct any per­son author­ised in writ­ing by the Author­ity in the exe­cu­tion of their duties in rela­tion to these byelaws. (9) Any per­son who con­tra­venes any of the fore­go­ing byelaws shall be guilty of an offence and shall be liable on sum­mary con­vic­tion to a fine not exceed­ing Level 2 on the Stand­ard Scale in respect of each offence. END

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Appendix 4 – Pro­cess to get byelaws in place

Sched­ule 2 to the 2000 Act provides at para­graph 9 for the pro­ced­ure to be fol­lowed where the Park Author­ity pro­poses to make byelaws. Sec­tions 202 to 204 of the Loc­al Gov­ern­ment (Scot­land) Act 1973 will also apply in rela­tion to the pro­posed byelaws. These impose addi­tion­al require­ments in rela­tion to the adop­tion and revoc­a­tion of byelaws.

The fol­low­ing steps will be required in order to pro­mote and con­firm byelaws under the 2000 Act:

• • • • • • The byelaws would have to be draf­ted by com­pet­ent leg­al pro­fes­sion­als. It will be import­ant for the draft­ing to be both detailed and pre­cise. The Author­ity would then have to obtain approv­al from the CNPA Board to allow the pro­posed byelaws to be pub­li­cised – this pro­cess will align with Park Author­ity times­cales and fre­quency of rel­ev­ant Board meet­ings; The pro­posed byelaws must then be made avail­able for pub­lic inspec­tion for at least 12 weeks and pub­li­cised in such man­ner as the Park Author­ity thinks fit; The Park Author­ity must con­sult: every loc­al author­ity and com­munity coun­cil any part of whose area is with­in the area to which the pro­posed byelaws would apply (the ​“byelaw area”); such per­sons as appear to the Author­ity to be rep­res­ent­at­ive of the interests of those who live, work, carry on busi­ness or engage in recre­ation­al activ­it­ies in the byelaw area; and such oth­er per­sons as the Author­ity thinks fit; Account must be taken of any views or com­ments provided by the con­sul­tees dur­ing the con­sulta­tion peri­od. The Author­ity may con­sider that the byelaws should remain the same or should be mod­i­fied. It is estim­ated that con­sid­er­a­tion of the com­ments may take anoth­er month at the end of the con­sulta­tion peri­od, although that may be longer or short­er depend­ing on the num­ber of objec­tions and com­ments received and the nature there­of; The Park Author­ity would then have to obtain author­ity to seek con­firm­a­tion of the byelaws from CNPA Board – this pro­cess will align with intern­al Author­ity times­cales and fre­quency of rel­ev­ant Board meetings;

Form­al Board Paper 3 24 Novem­ber 2023 Page 16 of 16

• • • • • At least one month before applic­a­tion for con­firm­a­tion of the byelaws is made, notice of: the inten­tion to apply for con­firm­a­tion; the place where a copy of the byelaws may be inspec­ted; and of the author­ity to whom objec­tions may be noti­fied – i.e. the Scot­tish Min­is­ters – must be giv­en in a news­pa­per cir­cu­lat­ing in the byelaw area. A copy of the byelaws must also be depos­ited at the offices of the Author­ity and shall at all reas­on­able hours be open to pub­lic inspec­tion without pay­ment. A copy of the byelaws should be provided to any per­son upon request; With­in one month after pub­lic­a­tion of the notice, any per­son can sub­mit a writ­ten objec­tion to the Scot­tish Min­is­ters; Before con­firm­ing the byelaws, the Scot­tish Min­is­ters must take into account any objec­tions received and may hold a loc­al inquiry or cause a loc­al inquiry to be held; The Scot­tish Min­is­ters may con­firm the byelaws with or without modi­fic­a­tion or may refuse to con­firm. They may fix the date on which the byelaws come into oper­a­tion. If no date is fixed, the byelaws will come into oper­a­tion one month after the date of con­firm­a­tion; and The Author­ity must, as soon as prac­tic­able after receiv­ing intim­a­tion of the con­firm­a­tion of the byelaws, give notice of: the con­firm­a­tion; the date on which the byelaws are to come into oper­a­tion; and the place where a copy of the byelaws as con­firmed may be inspec­ted, to be giv­en in a news­pa­per cir­cu­lat­ing in the byelaw area or in such oth­er man­ner as the Scot­tish Min­is­ters on the applic­a­tion of the Author­ity may determ­ine to be suf­fi­cient in the circumstances.