Minutes of the Resources Com­mit­tee meeting

Held at Cairngorms Nation­al Park Author­ity office, Grant­own-on-Spey In per­son 13 Feb­ru­ary 2026 at 10.00am

Present in person

• Lauren McCal­lum (Deputy Convener)
• Jack­ie Brierton
• Han­nah Grist
• Ian McLar­en
• Elean­or Mack­in­tosh (Sub for Sandy Bremner)
• Derek Ross

In attend­ance

• Grant Moir, Chief Exec­ut­ive Officer
• Kate Christie Head of Organ­isa­tion­al Development
• Louise Allen, Head of Fin­ance and Cor­por­ate Operations
• Kar­en John­stone, Clerk to the Board

Apo­lo­gies

• Rus­sell Jones (Chair)
• Sandy Brem­ner

Wel­come and introductions

1. The Deputy Chair wel­comed every­one to the meet­ing of the Resources Committee.

Approv­al of minutes of pre­vi­ous meetings

1. The draft minutes from the pre­vi­ous meet­ings on 07 Novem­ber 2025 and 16 Janu­ary 2026 were approved with no amendments.

Mat­ters arising not covered elsewhere

1. There were not mat­ters arising.

Actions from 24 Janu­ary 2025 meeting:

Inform­a­tion set out in Paper-6-FOISA_Complaints.pdf

Paper	Action	Status/​Comments
Paper 1	i. Return to com­mit­tee the new policy on staff recog­ni­tion ad reward once available.	Policy still under con­sid­er­a­tion, but Staff Bene­fits doc­u­ment has been developed and cir­cu­lated, which already sets out a num­ber of exist­ing benefits
Paper 5	i. Deputy CEO and Dir­ect­or of Cor­por­ate Ser­vices and Jack­ie Brier­ton to invest­ig­ate the pos­sib­il­ity of Cred­it Uni­ons for staff and park wide.	Open

Action points from 29 August 2025

At para	Action	Status/​Comments
15 g	i. Cap­ture if staff are mov­ing on to more seni­or roles out with the Park Author­ity in future reports.	In hand — will be repor­ted in 2026 Staff Reten­tion paper.

Action points from 7 Novem­ber 2025

At para	Action	Status/​Comments
12	i. Dry runs of new pro­ced­ures inten­tion­ally trig­ger­ing health and safety tri­als to be con­sidered by the Health and Safety Committee.	Open, and tabled for March Health and Safety Com­mit­tee meeting
16	i. Dir­ect­or of Cor­por­ate Ser­vices and Deputy CEO to have a chat off­line with Michael Wil­li­am­son about the hybrid car scheme.	Open
	ii. Head of Organ­isa­tion­al Devel­op­ment to share with the Com­mit­tee the doc­u­ment which details the bene­fits staff get and how this com­pares to oth­er com­par­able companies.	Actioned

Declar­a­tions of interest

1. There were no declar­a­tions of interest.

Budget mon­it­or­ing (Paper 1)

1. Louise Allen, Head of Fin­ance and Cor­por­ate Oper­a­tions presen­ted the paper which sets out an over­view of the Park Authority’s budget man­age­ment pos­i­tion at the end of Decem­ber — month nine of the ²⁰²⁵⁄₂₆ fin­an­cial year.

2. The Resources Com­mit­tee dis­cussed the paper and made the fol­low­ing com­ments: a) A Board Mem­ber asked wheth­er return­ing peat­land res­tor­a­tion budget might have implic­a­tions for future fund­ing. CEO explained this would not par­tic­u­larly affect fund­ing as the spend­ing is estim­ated at the begin­ning of the year, and budget revi­sions are car­ried out in Autumn. If there are funds avail­able, they are handed back and this allows them to be redeployed else­where. b) A Board Mem­ber raised con­cern that 81% of spend has been com­mit­ted, leav­ing 19% of funds to be spent with­in six weeks. Head of Fin­ance and Cor­por­ate Oper­a­tions explained that expendit­ure for the 19% has been planned how­ever the orders have not been placed yet on these. Dis­cus­sions were had around an altern­at­ive if spend­ing can­not hap­pen. CEO explained that there are recur­ring essen­tials that can be brought for­ward into expendit­ure for this year to free up expendit­ure for next year, so mon­ies will always be alloc­ated. c) A Board Mem­ber ques­tioned the Cairngorms 2030 (C2030) funds and if the Resources Com­mit­tee had an oversite on this. Head of Fin­ance and Cor­por­ate Oper­a­tions explained that is part of Nation­al Lot­tery Her­it­age Fund (NLHF) and there is a reck­on­ing at the end of the pro­ject. CEO agreed to bring a report look­ing back at the last fin­an­cial year to the next Com­mit­tee. d) Clar­ity was sought regard­ing Mott Mac­don­ald, if the money has to be spent with­in the next six weeks or if that can be car­ried for­ward. Head of Fin­ance and Cor­por­ate Oper­a­tions explained that money has to be spent, how­ever Mott Mac­don­ald is mon­it­or­ing this care­fully and ensur­ing that this will be spent by 31 March. e) Clar­ity was sought regard­ing the over­spend of £17,000 in facil­it­ies cap­it­al. Head of Fin­ance and Cor­por­ate Oper­a­tions explained this was a pro­fil­ing dif­fer­ence meas­ured the way spend happened in the pre­vi­ous year, and that a vari­ance of this size does not give con­cern. f) Clar­ity was sought regard­ing the £658.00 spend in eco­lo­gic­al res­tor­a­tion from the budget of £60,000. Head of Fin­ance and Cor­por­ate Oper­a­tions explained this is for woody struc­tures to be used in rivers to slow flow, how­ever it is prov­ing dif­fi­cult to get these delivered to the areas they are needed. How­ever, the team are con­fid­ent this will be com­pleted by the end of the year.

3. The Resources Com­mit­tee noted the paper agree­ing to the recom­mend­a­tions: a) Con­sider the budget man­age­ment pos­i­tion for ²⁰²⁵⁄₂₆.

Action Points Arising:

1. i. Bring a paper to the next Com­mit­tee meet­ing on the C2030 budget monitoring.

Budget devel­op­ment ²⁰²⁶⁄₂₇ (Paper 2)

1. Louise Allen, Head of Fin­ance and Cor­por­ate Oper­a­tions presen­ted the paper which updates the Resources Com­mit­tee on pro­gress made towards devel­op­ment of the budget for ²⁰²⁶⁄₂₇.

2. The Resources Com­mit­tee dis­cussed the paper and made the fol­low­ing com­ments: a) CEO noted that they are still wait­ing on con­firm­a­tion of the Nature Res­tor­a­tion Fund (NRF) bid to be agreed. Hope­ful this should be con­firmed in March.

3. The Resources Com­mit­tee noted the paper agree­ing to the recom­mend­a­tions: a) Review the pos­i­tion achieved in devel­op­ment of the ²⁰²⁶⁄₂₇ fin­an­cial year budget. b) Provide feed­back to officers pri­or to the present­a­tion of the budget pro­pos­als to the full board in March 2026.

4. Action Points Arising: None.

Draft Health and Safety Com­mit­tee Minutes (Paper 3)

1. Kate Christie, Head of Organ­isa­tion­al Devel­op­ment presen­ted the paper which sets out the minutes from the Health and Safety Com­mit­tee meet­ing on 24 Novem­ber 2025.

2. The Resources Com­mit­tee dis­cussed the paper and made the fol­low­ing com­ments: a) A Board Mem­ber ques­tioned under the Chil­dren in the Office risk assess­ment what con­sti­tutes a child. Head of Organ­isa­tion­al Devel­op­ment explained a child is from birth to 16 years old. The Park Author­ity wants to be able to sup­port stake­hold­ers to be able to attend meet­ings in the office and more recently there has been a request that some stake­hold­ers can only attend if they can bring their chil­dren in with them, how­ever par­ents are required to be with their chil­dren at all times, there is a well­being room avail­able with chan­ging tables and breast feed­ing facil­it­ates. A Board Mem­ber ques­tioned how this would impact teen­agers being able to come in for work exper­i­ence. Head of Organ­isa­tion­al Devel­op­ment explained this was still encour­aged and out­with the scope of this risk assess­ment. b) Staff were com­men­ded on AED train­ing being provided for all staff for aware­ness and build­ing con­fid­ence. c) Dis­cus­sions were had around key learn­ing fol­low­ing the all-ter­rain vehicle (ATV) incid­ent. CEO explained that was a unique incid­ent but high­lighted that good com­mu­nic­a­tions and ensur­ing safe routes must be adhered to are of key import­ance. Head of Organ­isa­tion­al Devel­op­ment explained that the Peat­land team are exem­plars of health and safety, and the report high­lighted that the Park Author­ity had ful­filled all their health and safety oblig­a­tions with regards to this incident.

3. The Resources Com­mit­tee noted the paper agree­ing to the recom­mend­a­tions: a) Note the minutes of the Health and Safety Committee.

4. Action Points Arising: None.

Draft Staff Con­sultat­ive For­um Minutes (Paper 4)

1. Kate Christie, Head of Organ­isa­tion­al Devel­op­ment presen­ted the paper which sets out the minutes from the Staff Con­sultat­ive For­um meet­ing on 03 Decem­ber 2025.

2. The Resources Com­mit­tee dis­cussed the paper and made the fol­low­ing com­ments: a) Dis­cus­sions were had around the sab­bat­ic­al policy and how a sab­bat­ic­al is agreed upon. Head of Organ­isa­tion­al Devel­op­ment explained the sab­bat­ic­al must sup­port devel­op­ment and bene­fit both the indi­vidu­al and the organ­isa­tion. Staff mem­bers have to apply, then this has to be approved against set cri­ter­ia. A Board Mem­ber ques­tioned if oth­er organ­isa­tions had a sim­il­ar policy, would the Park Author­ity provide this oppor­tun­ity for them to have their sab­bat­ic­al with­in the organ­isa­tion. CEO con­firmed that the Park Author­ity would provide this oppor­tun­ity to oth­ers if it fit into a cur­rent pro­ject / activ­ity. b) A Board Mem­ber ques­tioned if there are volun­teer days avail­able for staff. Head of Organ­isa­tion­al Devel­op­ment explained all staff can take up to three volun­teer days per year, which does not have to be with­in the Nation­al Park, how­ever the Volun­teer Officers encour­age staff to engage in their activ­it­ies. c) A Board Mem­ber noted they would be inter­ested in reports of the intake. Head of Organ­isa­tion­al Devel­op­ment agreed to bring a report to the Com­mit­tee next year on the uptake. d) A Board Mem­ber com­men­ted on the change in the flexi and toil policy, not­ing this encour­ages staff to be in charge of their own well­being which is very important.

3. The Resources Com­mit­tee noted the paper agree­ing to the recom­mend­a­tions: a) Notes the minutes of the Staff Con­sultat­ive Forum.

Action Points Arising:

1. i. Bring back a report on uptake of the new sab­bat­ic­al policy.

AOCB

1. A Board Mem­ber noted they feel con­flict res­ol­u­tion / act­ive listen­ing train­ing would be bene­fi­cial to Board Mem­bers to allow them to nav­ig­ate through dif­fi­cult con­ver­sa­tions / situations.

Date of Next Meeting

1. The date of the next meet­ing is 15 May 2026 online.

2. The meet­ing con­cluded at 10.56am

---

Actions from 24 Janu­ary 2025 meeting:

Inform­a­tion set out in Paper-6-FOISA_Complaints.pdf

Paper	Action	Status/​Comments
Paper 1	i. Return to com­mit­tee the new policy on staff recog­ni­tion ad reward once available.	Policy still under con­sid­er­a­tion, but Staff Bene­fits doc­u­ment has been developed and cir­cu­lated, which already sets out a num­ber of exist­ing benefits
Paper 5	i. Deputy CEO and Dir­ect­or of Cor­por­ate Ser­vices and Jack­ie Brier­ton to invest­ig­ate the pos­sib­il­ity of Cred­it Uni­ons for staff and park wide.	Open

Action points from 29 August 2025

At para	Action	Status/​Comments
15 g	i. Cap­ture if staff are mov­ing on to more seni­or roles out with the Park Author­ity in future reports.	In hand — will be repor­ted in 2026 Staff Reten­tion paper.

Action points from 7 Novem­ber 2025

At para	Action	Status/​Comments
12	i. Dry runs of new pro­ced­ures inten­tion­ally trig­ger­ing health and safety tri­als to be con­sidered by the Health and Safety Committee.	Open, and tabled for March Health and Safety Com­mit­tee meeting
16	i. Dir­ect­or of Cor­por­ate Ser­vices and Deputy CEO to have a chat off­line with Michael Wil­li­am­son about the hybrid car scheme.	Com­plete

Action points from 13 Feb­ru­ary 2026

Paper 1 — Budget Monitoring

| At para | Action | Status/​Comments | | : — — — | : — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — —