240221 Update on Casework paper2

CAIRNGORMS LOC­AL OUT­DOOR ACCESS FOR­UM PAPER 2: 24^th Feb­ru­ary 2021

CAIRNGORMS LOC­AL OUT­DOOR ACCESS FORUM

Title: Update on access case­work from 2018 – 2020 Pre­pared by: Doug Stew­art, Out­door Access Officer Pur­pose: I. To update mem­bers on case­work hand­ling of all types includ­ing monthly break­downs and sum­mary of key types by volume.

1. To con­sider find­ings and indic­at­ive fore­casts based on rel­ev­ant factors and the post-Cov­id 19 environment.

Back­ground

1. The Nation­al Park Author­ity has a range of duties and respons­ib­il­it­ies requir­ing pro­vi­sion of advice to intern­al col­leagues and key part­ners along­side respond­ing to both gen­er­al enquir­ies from the pub­lic and also com­plaints over obstruc­tions to and/​or inter­fer­ence with the exer­cise of stat­utory access rights. In order to both mon­it­or and pro­cess these tasks a ​‘case­work’ record is main­tained. This ​‘log’ records num­bers and types of case­work includ­ing dates, hand­ling times and a record of con­tacts made dur­ing processing.

Case­work Handling

1. Man­age­ment of case­work work­load is an ongo­ing con­sid­er­a­tion with the present sys­tem alloc­at­ing cas­work on the basis of a 50:50 split between the two Out­door Access Officers in post. Depend­ing on the com­plex­ity or nature of any giv­en case col­lab­or­a­tion and dis­cus­sion often takes place towards ensur­ing bal­anced decision mak­ing. Pro­cessing, record­ing and alloc­a­tion is sup­por­ted by an admin­is­trat­ive sup­port officer.

Ana­lys­is of Annu­al Records

1. A new case­work log­ging pro­ced­ure was inple­men­ted dur­ing June 2018 there­fore records for the first 6 months of that year are incom­plete, reas­on being the pre­vi­ous record­ing sys­tem did not main­tain a full log, includ­ing not record­ing cer­tain intern­al case­work hand­ling such as gen­er­al ad-hoc enquir­ies. Data for 2018 has how­ever been included in this report­ing exer­cise in order to allow com­par­is­on over those months where records are complete.

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CAIRNGORMS LOC­AL OUT­DOOR ACCESS FOR­UM PAPER 2: 24^th Feb­ru­ary 2021

1. To date records demon­strate a gradu­al upward trend over the review peri­od which is also sup­por­ted if an aver­age of ²⁰¹⁹⁄₂₀ totals is used to fill the gaps present in the 2018 record.

2. Last year (2020) showed an increase in all types of case­work post-lock­down dur­ing the second half of the year. This increase arose des­pite the peri­od of full lock­down pre­vent­ing all but once-daily out­door activ­ity for two months and thereby redu­cing most out­door vis­its sig­ni­fic­antly. The increase in case­work orgin­at­ing from the pub­lic is very likely to be as a res­ult of great­er num­bers of people vis­it­ing and recre­at­ing in the out­doors fol­low­ing eas­ing whilst also impacted by national/​global travel restrictions.

3. Plan­ning and Forestry case­work also showed high­er than aver­age volumes post lock­down, this is pre­sumed due to an abate­ment in busi­ness activ­ity dur­ing full lock­down lead­ing to a reduc­tion and, fol­low­ing eas­ing, a resump­tion in activ­ity again prob­ably also pre­cip­it­ated by the lift­ing of travel restrictions.

Doug Stew­art 11/02/20

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CAIRNGORMS LOC­AL OUT­DOOR ACCESS FOR­UM PAPER 2: 24^th Feb­ru­ary 2021

Case­work Totals by Month/​Year: all Categories

[Chart data in image — not eas­ily con­vert­ible to text]

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CAIRNGORMS LOC­AL OUT­DOOR ACCESS FOR­UM PAPER 2: 24^th Feb­ru­ary 2021

Case­work Totals by Month/​Year: all Cat­egor­ies ex. Plan­ning & Forestry

[Chart data in image — not eas­ily con­vert­ible to text]

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Case­work Totals by Year/​Category

[Chart data in image — not eas­ily con­vert­ible to text]

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