Formal board meeting - paper 1: CEO report - 28 November 2025

Cairngorms Nation­al Park Author­ity Ugh­dar­ras Pàirc Nàiseanta a’ Mhon­aidh Ruaidh

Form­al Board Paper 1 28 Novem­ber 2025

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For inform­a­tion

Title: CEO Report and Con­vener Update Pre­pared by: Grant Moir, Chief Exec­ut­ive Officer

Pur­pose To high­light to Board Mem­bers the main stra­tegic areas of work that are being dir­ec­ted by Man­age­ment Team. These are areas where sig­ni­fic­ant staff resources are being dir­ec­ted to deliv­er with part­ners the aspir­a­tions of the Nation­al Park Part­ner­ship Plan (NPPP).

Nature and Cli­mate Change

1. Wild­fire: fol­low­ing on from the Wild­fire Sum­mit held by the Min­is­ter for Agri­cul­ture and Con­nectiv­ity, con­ver­sa­tions about wild­fire have con­tin­ued. Park staff atten­ded the South Grampi­an Wild­fire Group (SGWG) and dis­cussed how the byelaw might oper­ate in 2026. The SGWG is the only func­tion­ing wild­fire group in the Park and its sys­tems provide a mod­el for how oth­er col­lab­or­at­ive groups might work. Park staff also atten­ded the Wild­fire Ready meet­ing at Rot­tal, Glen Clova which was largely atten­ded by a farm­ing audience.
2. Peat­land res­tor­a­tion: is pro­gress­ing well in 2026. The annu­al tar­get is 1700 hec­tares (ha) and it is estim­ated some 1100ha have been brought under res­tor­a­tion by Octo­ber. Cur­rently 15 pro­jects are being worked on or are already com­pleted. Multi-year res­tor­a­tion plans are being developed for some large estates to help secure a pipeline of pro­jects for future years.
3. Nature Res­tor­a­tion Fund: Good pro­gress is being made on pro­jects to pro­tect nature and strengthen our resi­li­ence to cli­mate change. Pri­or­ity actions in the Caper­cail­lie Emer­gency Plan are mov­ing ahead, with redund­ant fences being removed to reduce col­li­sion risks, dense heath­er cut, and cattle graz­ing expan­ded to cre­ate more diversity in our wood­lands. In Strath­spey, sur­veys of key aspen sites and invest­ment in a loc­al tree nurs­ery will help pro­tect rare lichens and strengthen the aspen net­work for the future. Sig­ni­fic­ant pro­gress is also being made on insect recov­ery, with new meth­ods for rear­ing wood ant and nar­row-headed ant colon­ies prov­ing suc­cess­ful and poten­tial release sites being mapped across Deeside, Angus and Perthshire.

Cairngorms Nation­al Park Author­ity Ugh­dar­ras Pàirc Nàiseanta a’ Mhon­aidh Ruaidh

Form­al Board Paper 1 28 Novem­ber 2025

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1. Fresh­wa­ter pearl mus­sel: Togeth­er with the Spey Fish­ery Board, NatureScot and John Hut­ton Insti­tute (JHI) the Park organ­ised a fact-find­ing trip to mus­sel con­ser­va­tion breed­ing facil­it­ies in the Lake Dis­trict and Cum­bria — invest­ig­a­tion under­way into the feas­ib­il­ity of set­ting up facil­it­ies with­in the Nation­al Park. Hab­it­at assess­ment work on the Dee and some of the trib­u­tar­ies of the Spey is under­way to identi­fy poten­tial release sites for mus­sels in the future.
2. Dee Resi­li­ence Strategy Group: Work­ing with the River Dee Trust to fund and man­age a con­tract to devel­op a hydro­lo­gic­al mod­el of the upper catch­ment — the required first part of work to determ­ine where nature-based solu­tions will have the greatest impact for drought and flood resi­li­ence to ​‘smooth the flow’. We are link­ing with a nature-based fin­ance mod­el developed by NatureScot. The Dee Resi­li­ence Officer Rachel Helli­well starts on the 23 November.

Plan­ning and Place

1. Paths and long-dis­tance routes: A con­tract was let for fur­ther improve­ment works to the Spey­side Way at Insh and Inver­uglas with work star­ted in mid-Novem­ber. Gate remov­al / replace­ment work has been com­pleted on the Crom­dale to the Park bound­ary sec­tion and more work with loc­al landown­ers is under­way between Grant­own and Nethy Bridge. These improve­ments will make the route more usable by cyc­lists and horse riders in par­tic­u­lar while also mak­ing it more access­ible for those with wheel­chairs, bug­gies etc. Work is under way with the new Car­rbridge Com­munity Coun­cil and oth­er loc­al stake­hold­ers to final­ise details for the path link­ing the new hous­ing devel­op­ment on Carr Road to the vil­lage centre with a plan­ning applic­a­tion for the pre­ferred route expec­ted to be sub­mit­ted in early 2026.
2. Core Paths Plan Review: An inform­al con­sulta­tion on a review of the Core Paths Plan closed in August with 208 responses received. The Access team have been work­ing through the responses and assess­ing sug­ges­tions with these help­ing inform the devel­op­ment of a draft Core Paths Plan which will be form­ally con­sul­ted on in 2026. A con­sulta­tion report was also pro­duced for the Loc­al Out­door Access For­um. Pre­par­at­ory work is also under way regard­ing the assess­ments neces­sary on the draft Plan – Stra­tegic Envir­on­ment­al Assess­ment, Hab­it­ats Reg­u­la­tion Assess­ment and Equal­it­ies Impact Assessment.
3. Loc­al Out­door Access For­um (LOAF): The LOAF con­sidered the Core Paths Plan con­sulta­tion report at their meet­ing in Novem­ber and dis­cussed in more detail some of the more com­plex route sug­ges­tions that required con­sid­er­a­tion before inclu­sion in the draft plan. The LOAF also con­sidered future mem­ber­ship and the elec­tion of a new con­vener as John Gri­er­son is step­ping down after six years in the role.

Cairngorms Nation­al Park Author­ity Ugh­dar­ras Pàirc Nàiseanta a’ Mhon­aidh Ruaidh

Form­al Board Paper 1 28 Novem­ber 2025

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1. Vis­it­or infra­struc­ture: Approx­im­ately £325,000 has been alloc­ated and grants offered from the Vis­it­or Infra­struc­ture Improve­ment Pro­gramme held by the Park Author­ity. They include pro­jects such as paths works at Loch an Eilean, the Cairns on Bal­mor­al Estate and in Glen Quoi­ch as well as smal­ler grants for devel­op­ment includ­ing feas­ib­il­ity work on a Brae­mar Aire site and an alloc­a­tion of match fund­ing towards a Rur­al Tour­ism Infra­struc­ture Fund bid for Glen­more Beach Car Park improvements.
2. Access­ib­il­ity Intern­ship: The Park Author­ity employed an intern from July until Octo­ber 2025 to under­take some ded­ic­ated work on access­ib­il­ity. This included work­ing with the Badenoch and Strath­spey Access Pan­el to assist them in updat­ing their access guide while also col­lat­ing equi­val­ent inform­a­tion for oth­er areas of the Nation­al Park with a view to this then provid­ing bet­ter access­ib­il­ity inform­a­tion on the Nation­al Park web­site. Work was also under­taken to identi­fy and sur­vey access­ible Paths with three paths (in Nethy Bridge, Boat of Garten and Kin­gussie) meas­ured against the access­ible path stand­ard. These will be pro­moted on the Access­ib­il­ity page of the Park web­site, and the indi­vidu­al path pages will provide more detailed inform­a­tion about the routes. This work also led to a ​“toolkit” that will be used by oth­er officers in the com­ing months to identi­fy and sup­port fur­ther access­ible routes includ­ing bring­ing more paths up to access­ible standard.
3. Ranger ser­vices: The team of 12 sea­son­al rangers that were in place for the sum­mer fin­ished in mid-Octo­ber with the reg­u­lar patrols also fin­ish­ing at this time. Work is under way to under­take a restruc­ture of the ranger ser­vice to reflect the addi­tion­al require­ments that will come with com­mence­ment of the fire byelaw as well as provid­ing an enhanced Park Author­ity ranger pres­ence in the south­ern part of the park from spring 2026.
4. Trans­port – Cyc­ling and beha­viour change activ­ity: The first set of organ­ised led rides to school known as ​“Bike buses” and pri­or­it­ised for young­er chil­dren in Primary one to Primary three, took place over sum­mer at Aviemore, Grant­own and Deshar (Boat of Garten) primary schools before fin­ish­ing at the start of the Octo­ber school hol­i­days. 71 chil­dren signed up for bike buses across the three schools. A user / par­ent sur­vey has taken place and while response num­bers were quite low these indic­ated a 23% increase in chil­dren cyc­ling as their nor­mal way of get­ting to school, and an asso­ci­ated 23% decrease in chil­dren being driv­en as their nor­mal way of get­ting to school as well as encour­aging more cyc­ling on oth­er days. Work is now under way on a new con­tract for 2026 to con­tin­ue the exist­ing routes while trans­ition­ing them to a par­ent / volun­teer led while also adding fur­ther routes includ­ing bike buses for New­ton­more and Nethy Bridge primary schools.

Cairngorms Nation­al Park Author­ity Ugh­dar­ras Pàirc Nàiseanta a’ Mhon­aidh Ruaidh

Form­al Board Paper 1 28 Novem­ber 2025

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Work­place activ­ity has also taken place includ­ing organ­ised cycle repair work­shops reach­ing over 50 employ­ees to sup­port them with their cyc­ling at work needs. This builds on an iden­ti­fied need to build cycle con­fid­ence includ­ing cycle main­ten­ance checks and repairs as well as cycle rid­ing skills to encour­age more cyc­ling. As with the schools’ activ­it­ies plan­ning is now under way to devel­op a fur­ther pro­gramme to sup­port work­places in 2026.

1. Trans­port — Act­ive Com­munit­ies: Design devel­op­ment activ­ity is now under way for Aviemore and Boat of Garten with a design review to identi­fy risks with the ori­gin­al concept designs developed in the Cairngorms 2030 Devel­op­ment phase. An exten­sion to the con­tract with the con­sult­ants is being agreed to cov­er fur­ther design devel­op­ment in both Nethy Bridge and New­ton­more. Pub­lic engage­ment for com­munity led feed­back on design needs is planned for early December.
2. Pub­lic Trans­port Improve­ments: With sup­port from the Park Author­ity, fund­ing has been secured by the High­land Coun­cil to invest in bus stop improve­ments along the Glen­more cor­ridor to encour­age pub­lic trans­port use. Con­struc­tion of new bus shel­ters is expec­ted by March 2026.
3. Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan (LDP): Work on com­pil­ing evid­ence for the next LDP is draw­ing to a close. Engage­ment on top­ic papers is now com­plete, with con­sulta­tion on the final papers cov­er­ing policy mon­it­or­ing, blue and green infra­struc­ture, and play, sport and recre­ation end­ing on 31 Octo­ber 2025. The team are now final­ising the form­al Evid­ence Report, which will be repor­ted to Board for approv­al in early 2026 before being sub­mit­ted for an inde­pend­ent ​‘gate check’ assess­ment by Scot­tish Government’s Divi­sion of Plan­ning and Envir­on­ment­al Appeals (DPEA). An annu­al update to the Devel­op­ment Plan Scheme, which sets out the timetable for the next stages in pre­par­ing the new LDP, is repor­ted to Board for approv­al at this meeting.
4. Plan­ning case­work: The plan­ning com­mit­tee met on 14 Novem­ber 2025 to con­sider a plan­ning applic­a­tion for realign­ment of a 400m stretch of the River Tromie close to its con­flu­ence with the River Spey, and two ret­ro­spect­ive plan­ning applic­a­tions for track upgrades on the Muck­rach Estate near Car­rbridge. The com­mit­tee will meet once more this year, on 12 Decem­ber 2025.

Com­mu­nic­a­tions and Engagement

1. Engage­ment events: The team have facil­it­ated and organ­ised two road­show events dur­ing this peri­od. The Strath­don drop-in road­show on 24 Septem­ber, which included the launch of the loc­al Com­munity Action Plan, was atten­ded by 35 people, plus a fur­ther 25 attend­ing a bespoke ses­sion with the loc­al Sil­ver Circle group before­hand. The Kin­craig fun day took place on 27 Septem­ber, with over 400 loc­al com­munity mem­bers in attend­ance. We delivered ses­sions on beavers,

Cairngorms Nation­al Park Author­ity Ugh­dar­ras Pàirc Nàiseanta a’ Mhon­aidh Ruaidh

Form­al Board Paper 1 28 Novem­ber 2025

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Cairngorms 2030 and nature storytelling, with 84 people dir­ectly engaged at the stall. Else­where, the suc­cess­ful ​‘Pledge Pro­cess Plan­et’ exhib­i­tion — led by artists from the Nation­al Park — has been on tour in Kin­gussie and Brae­mar through­out Octo­ber, spark­ing con­ver­sa­tions around cli­mate change.

1. Cairngorms Busi­ness Part­ner­ship (CBP): The CBP con­fer­ence took place on 12 Novem­ber, sup­por­ted by the Park Author­ity. The Com­munit­ies and Rur­al Devel­op­ment and Beaver teams were in attend­ance to provide inform­a­tion on Cairngorms 2030, trans­port and act­ive travel, the upcom­ing Com­munit­ies Fund and our beaver work. Else­where, we are sup­port­ing CBP to deliv­er a winter mar­ket­ing cam­paign — ​‘Where Winter Comes to Life’ — for a fourth suc­cess­ive year. Work­ing closely with loc­al busi­nesses across the region, this year’s cam­paign will include a blend of PR oppor­tun­it­ies, digit­al and Spo­ti­fy advert­ising and press visits.
2. Cul­tur­al her­it­age net­work­ing event: Designed by a short-term work­ing group made up of nine indi­vidu­als from a range of dif­fer­ent cul­tur­al her­it­age back­grounds (from farm­ing to museums and loc­al artists), a cul­tur­al her­it­age event took place on 09 Octo­ber at Boat of Garten Hall. 65 people from across the Nation­al Park with a wide range of cul­tur­al her­it­age interests took part. There was excel­lent energy in the room for devel­op­ing a net­work for the sec­tor and we will pub­lish a fol­low up report on 05 Decem­ber sum­mar­ising next steps (includ­ing a second event in March).
3. Com­munit­ies and cul­tur­al her­it­age fund: Launched at the cul­tur­al her­it­age net­work­ing event, the Park Author­ity have gran­ted the Cairngorms Trust £50,000 to deliv­er a fund for com­munity organ­isa­tions, focused on com­munit­ies and cul­ture pri­or­it­ies from Com­munity Action Plans. Grants ran­ging from £2,500 to £10,000 are avail­able, cov­er­ing both rev­en­ue and cap­it­al costs, and pro­jects must be com­pleted by 10 Feb­ru­ary 2027.
4. Cairngorms 2030 Com­munit­ies Fund: The Grants and Com­munit­ies / Rur­al Devel­op­ment teams have been busy shap­ing the early stages of a new £1 mil­lion Cairngorms 2030 Com­munit­ies Fund, to be designed by com­munit­ies from across the Nation­al Park and fur­ther afield. Next steps include recruit­ing a co-design group of 18 people, recruit­ment for which will begin in Janu­ary. The group will then receive train­ing on fund design and dif­fer­ent meth­ods of decision-mak­ing, before begin­ning to devel­op the fund ready for launch in sum­mer 2026.
5. Cor­por­ate com­mu­nic­a­tions: The approv­al of the fire byelaw by min­is­ters in Septem­ber had extens­ive media cov­er­age, lead­ing the north STV News at Six pro­gramme and fea­tur­ing prom­in­ently on BBC Report­ing Scot­land and across radio, print and digit­al out­lets (total reach of 266 stor­ies, or an estim­ated reach of 700 mil­lion). There was also sig­ni­fic­ant press interest in the wild­fire sum­mit hosted

Cairngorms Nation­al Park Author­ity Ugh­dar­ras Pàirc Nàiseanta a’ Mhon­aidh Ruaidh

Form­al Board Paper 1 28 Novem­ber 2025

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by Scot­tish Gov­ern­ment (SG) in Grant­own a few weeks later, lead­ing to fol­low-up art­icles in nation­al and loc­al media, some of which ref­er­enced the byelaw and oth­er fire mit­ig­a­tion work in the Nation­al Park.

Agri­cul­tur­al Adviser Mal­colm Smith is due to make his debut as a colum­nist in the Press and Journ­al farm­ing sec­tion on Sat­urday 29 Novem­ber. The P&J will run a column from him every two months, present­ing an excit­ing new oppor­tun­ity to update the farm­ing com­munity on our agri­cul­ture work and on Malcolm’s activ­it­ies in particular.

Earli­er this month, BBC Land­ward car­ried a piece on the eDNA fresh­wa­ter research being car­ried out by the Park Author­ity in part­ner­ship with UHI, fea­tur­ing Beaver Pro­ject Man­ager, Jonath­an Willet.

1. Brand­ing and pub­lic­a­tions: The winter edi­tion of Cairn magazine has been delivered to res­id­ents in the Nation­al Park over the past couple of weeks. It’s a packed issue, with high­lights includ­ing fea­tures on the com­munity impact of grant fund­ing across the Nation­al Park, the pro­gress of Nature Res­tor­a­tion Fund pro­jects with par­tic­u­lar focus on ants and fresh­wa­ter pearl mus­sels – and an intro­duc­tion to the new Dùthchas Award.

We’ve worked with two new pho­to­graph­ers to com­mis­sion enga­ging fresh imagery of our peat­land res­tor­a­tion work and of fam­il­ies and young people out and about enjoy­ing in the Nation­al Park. Mean­while, the inter­pret­a­tion pro­ject at the new Tomin­toul Sky Hide is pro­gress­ing well, and upgrades to pan­els at the Bellabeg shop in Strath­don, the vis­it­or inform­a­tion board at Nethy Bridge and Drumochter are also in the works.

1. Social media and web­site: Between 01 Septem­ber and 05 Novem­ber we received over three mil­lion impres­sions (up 154% on the pre­vi­ous year) and 120,385 engage­ments (up 193% on the pre­vi­ous year) across all chan­nels. Our engage­ment rate is 4% (up 15.2% on the pre­vi­ous year) and our net audi­ence growth in this peri­od was 5,116, tak­ing us to a total of 79,241 across Ins­tagram, Face­book, Linked­In and Bluesky (up from just over 60,000 a year ago). Video views totalled almost 600,000.

We have been explor­ing dif­fer­ent ways of present­ing con­tent around cul­tur­al her­it­age (example here) and con­ser­va­tion (example here), with the res­ults of these exper­i­ments being cap­tured and used to inform future con­tent development.

The new web­site had just over 82,000 views dur­ing the peri­od, with pop­u­lar pages includ­ing things to do, paths and trails and the map. Devel­op­ment work con­tin­ues on the cre­ation of a new map­ping mod­ule, which will allow us to cre­ate bespoke

Cairngorms Nation­al Park Author­ity Ugh­dar­ras Pàirc Nàiseanta a’ Mhon­aidh Ruaidh

Form­al Board Paper 1 28 Novem­ber 2025

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maps for everything from paths and trails to points of interest, com­munity assets and spe­cif­ic eco­lo­gic­al features.

A major focus for the whole team over the com­ing months will be the cre­ation of mater­i­als to sup­port the new fire man­age­ment byelaw. In early Novem­ber we hos­ted some of the cre­at­ive team who will be work­ing on the pro­ject. They met with indi­vidu­als and part­ners in the east and west of the Nation­al Park to hear more about the issues at hand, spoke to rangers on the ground, and got a sense of com­munity con­cerns and aspir­a­tions for the byelaw itself.

Organ­isa­tion­al Development

1. Staff­ing update: Since Septem­ber, the fol­low­ing staff changes took place:

2. Staff leav­ing the organ­isa­tion: a) Barn­aby Fogg com­pleted his intern­ship as Dis­ab­il­ity Access Intern. b) Simon Thomas resigned from his role as Peat­land Action Pro­ject Officer to join anoth­er organ­isa­tion. c) Colin Bry­ans resigned from his role as Seni­or Plan­ning Officer to join anoth­er organ­isa­tion. d) Craig Lews resigned from his role as payroll, Accounts and Fin­ance Officer to go travelling.

3. Staff join­ing the organ­isa­tion: Extern­al recruit­ment activ­ity is at a min­im­um, as the Park Author­ity is oper­at­ing at full com­ple­ment, and recruit­ment is typ­ic­ally only to replace vacant posts, or part­ner fun­ded posts. Nev­er­the­less, the Park Author­ity is attract­ing a large num­ber of applic­a­tions and is seen as a very good employ­er. Recent appoint­ments are: α) Rachel Helli­well joined the organ­isa­tion as River Dee Catch­ment Officer. This is a new fixed term post for 18 months.

4. Ranger update: The Sea­son­al Rangers and Train­ee Rangers’ con­tract ended in Octo­ber. Recruit­ment will com­mence for next season’s cohort in early 2026.

5. Staff appoint­ments: There were no intern­al staff appoint­ment in the report­ing period

6. Roles appoin­ted for future dates

Cairngorms Nation­al Park Author­ity Ugh­dar­ras Pàirc Nàiseanta a’ Mhon­aidh Ruaidh

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α) We have suc­cess­fully appoin­ted to the Con­ser­va­tion Officer – Nature Res­tor­a­tion Fund. This is a new post, fixed term for 18-month com­men­cing in December.

1. Live recruit­ment: posts cur­rently being recruited are: α) Seni­or Plan­ning Officer, to replace Colin Bry­ans. b) Fin­ance Assist­ant, to replace Craig Lewis.
2. Organ­isa­tion­al Devel­op­ment: The bien­ni­al Best Com­pan­ies staff sur­vey was launched in Novem­ber. This sur­vey is a key tool to inform organ­isa­tion devel­op­ment activ­ity for the next two years. It meas­ures staff engage­ment across eight factors: Lead­er­ship, My Man­ager, Well­being, My Com­pany, My Team, Fair Deal, Giv­ing Some­thing Back, Per­son­al Growth. It also provides staff with the oppor­tun­ity to com­ment on what makes the Park Author­ity a great place to work for, and what would make it a bet­ter place. The sur­vey is con­duc­ted extern­ally, and all responses are anonym­ous. We expect to get res­ults back by early Janu­ary and will report these to board via the Resources Committee.
3. Equal­ity: The Park Author­ity entered and won the Herad and S1Jobs Top Employ­er award in the ​“Best Diversity and Inclu­sion Dynam­ic in the Work­place” cat­egory. The judges key points from our entry lead­ing to the win were: ​“Cairngorms Nation­al Park Author­ity were chosen as the win­ner for their excep­tion­al, organ­isa­tion-wide lead­er­ship in embed­ding equal­ity, diversity and inclu­sion. Through bold policies, lived-exper­i­ence part­ner­ships and meas­ur­able impact, it has cre­ated a thriv­ing, diverse work­force and delivered innov­at­ive ini­ti­at­ives that make the Park — and the organ­isa­tion itself — a truly inclus­ive ​“Park for All.”

Pro­cure­ment

1. Train­ing was provided for the wider staff group by Scot­land Excel. Three full-day ses­sions were provided cov­er­ing: Spe­cific­a­tion writ­ing and devel­op­ment. a) b) Use of eval­u­ation cri­ter­ia for sup­pli­er selec­tion and con­tract award. c) Con­tract and sup­pli­er management.
2. The Pro­cure­ment Officer atten­ded the Pro­curex con­fer­ence in Glas­gow. This is the main event of the year for sup­pli­ers and pub­lic sec­tor pro­fes­sion­als. The key top­ics for dis­cus­sion were com­munity wealth-build­ing and sustainability.

Cairngorms Nation­al Park Author­ity Ugh­dar­ras Pàirc Nàiseanta a’ Mhon­aidh Ruaidh

Form­al Board Paper 1 28 Novem­ber 2025

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Grant Moir 13 Novem­ber 2025 grantmoir@​cairngorms.​co.​uk

Title: Cairngorms Nation­al Park Author­ity Ugh­dar­ras Pàirc Nàiseanta a’ Mhon­aidh Ruaidh Form­al Board Paper 1 28 Novem­ber 2025 Convener’s update Page 10 of 12 Pre­pared by: Sandy Brem­ner, Board Convener

Pur­pose To high­light to board mem­bers and Seni­or Man­age­ment Team (SMT) and staff of the meet­ings and events the Board Con­vener has been attend­ing since the last Form­al Board meeting.

1. Act­ive Travel – Under­took mul­tiple in-per­son and video meet­ings, and fol­low-up email exchanges with Scot­tish Gov­ern­ment min­is­ters and seni­or offi­cials to help secure design-stage fund­ing for our Cairngorms 2030 Act­ive Travel pro­jects, in col­lab­or­a­tion with our CEO and seni­or man­age­ment team, finally secur­ing £854,000 of fund­ing for pro­jects at Aviemore, Boat of Garten, Nethy Bridge and Newtonmore.
2. Con­ven­tion of the High­lands and Islands (COHI) – Atten­ded COHI on Arran, co- chaired by Deputy First Min­is­ter Kate For­bes and Pub­lic Fin­ance Min­is­ter Ivan McK­ee, con­trib­ut­ing to the main dis­cus­sion on Com­munity Wealth Build­ing and the oppor­tun­it­ies and poten­tial chal­lenges presen­ted by upcom­ing legislation.
3. The Envir­on­ment and Forestry Dir­ect­or­ate (EnFor) Chairs – Atten­ded EnFor in Edin­burgh, dis­cuss­ing pre­lim­in­ary guid­ance on future budget set­tle­ments, the effect­ive­ness of Scot­tish Gov­ern­ment and Inter Agency Com­mu­nic­a­tions, and a range of issues affect­ing pub­lic bodies.
4. Gil­lian Mar­tin – Meet­ing with Cab­in­et Sec­ret­ary for Cli­mate Action and Energy on deliv­ery of the Park Author­ity and stake­hold­er pro­jects to meet Scot­tish Gov­ern­ment biod­iversity tar­gets, and the scope for fur­ther engage­ment on key areas of interest.
5. Busi­ness Con­fer­ence – Atten­ded annu­al con­fer­ence of the Cairngorms Busi­ness Part­ner­ship, meet­ing with own­ers of small and medi­um-sized busi­nesses across the Park, dis­cuss­ing a range of issues includ­ing the ser­i­ous con­straints posed by a short­age of afford­able housing.

Cairngorms Nation­al Park Author­ity Ugh­dar­ras Pàirc Nàiseanta a’ Mhon­aidh Ruaidh Form­al Board Paper 1 28 Novem­ber 2025

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1. Strath­don – Atten­ded Strath­don Com­munity engage­ment day, com­bined with launch of Devel­op­ment Trust Action Plan. Meet­ing Trust mem­bers and loc­al res­id­ents, dis­cuss­ing the Park Authority’s responses to the mul­tiple chal­lenges facing the area and poten­tial route-maps to resolv­ing long-stand­ing issues.
2. Cul­tur­al Her­it­age – Atten­ded Nation­al Park-wide event at the Boat of Garten Hall, sup­por­ted by the Park Author­ity, bring­ing togeth­er people involved in cul­tur­al her­it­age to col­lab­or­ate, share ideas and dis­cuss key pri­or­it­ies for the com­ing years.
3. EnFor Talk – Delivered inaug­ur­al Non-Depart­ment­al Pub­lic Bod­ies Chairs talk to 60 staff of the Envir­on­ment and Forestry Dir­ect­or­ate on lead­er­ship exper­i­ences, les­sons learned, and approaches to pub­lic policy challenges.
4. Nation­al Parks – Atten­ded Nation­al Parks Part­ner­ship For­um, agree­ing responses to UK-wide chal­lenges and dis­cuss­ing and approv­ing the full activ­a­tion of a Nation­al Park Part­ner­ship Found­a­tion to source sig­ni­fic­ant cor­por­ate fund­ing to sup­port the work of indi­vidu­al Nation­al Parks.
5. King’s Found­a­tion – Met King’s Found­a­tion Trust­ee to provide the latest update on Nation­al Park activ­it­ies and pre­par­a­tions for work on the next stages of devel­op­ment of the Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan (LDP) and the NPPP.
6. Media — Provided com­ments for media on Min­is­teri­al approv­al for the Park Authority’s recre­ation­al fires byelaw, the pro­cess of gain­ing wide­spread pub­lic sup­port, and next steps on imple­ment­a­tion, along with reg­u­lar columns for loc­al news­pa­pers on com­munity, farm­ing and pro­ject-devel­op­ment issues.
7. Busi­ness Chairs – Atten­ded meet­ing of the Chairs and CEOs of the Cairngorms Busi­ness Part­ner­ship, dis­cuss­ing stra­tegic pri­or­it­ies for the year ahead.
8. Busi­ness / Legis­la­tion – Met indi­vidu­al rep­res­ent­at­ive of the Cairngorms Busi­ness Part­ner­ship, dis­cuss­ing the Nat­ur­al Envir­on­ment (Scot­land) Bill and the list­ings of Nation­al Park aims.
9. High­lands and Islands Enter­prise (HIE) – Met with the Chief Exec­ut­ive of HIE, dis­cuss­ing the range of Com­munity Wealth Build­ing ini­ti­at­ives around the National

Cairngorms Nation­al Park Author­ity Ugh­dar­ras Pàirc Nàiseanta a’ Mhon­aidh Ruaidh Form­al Board Paper 1 28 Novem­ber 2025

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Park, the implic­a­tions of new legis­la­tion, and oth­er oppor­tun­it­ies for eco­nom­ic development.

1. Nature Awards – Atten­ded Nature of Scot­land awards, meet­ing rep­res­ent­at­ives of the Park Authority’s part­ner and stake­hold­er organisations.
2. Hut­ton – Met with the CEO and seni­or staff of the James Hut­ton Insti­tute, dis­cuss­ing stra­tegic rela­tion­ships and the poten­tial for expan­ded facil­it­ies to sup­port the work of the Park Author­ity and part­ner organisations.
3. Catch­ment Strategy – Atten­ded intro­duct­ory meet­ing with the newly-appoin­ted Pro­ject Officer sup­port­ing the work of the Dee Resi­li­ence Strategy Group, dis­cuss­ing stake­hold­er pri­or­it­ies and the urgency of deliv­er­ing res­ults for nature and communities.
4. Big Pic­ture – First meet­ing with new CEO of the Scot­land the Big Pic­ture group, dis­cuss­ing pub­lic engage­ment ini­ti­at­ives and the times­cales for devel­op­ment of the next NPPP.
5. Nation­al Park Con­veners – Met reg­u­larly with the Con­vener of the Loch Lomond and Trossachs Nation­al Park Board to dis­cuss issues of mutu­al interest.
6. Park Author­ity Liais­on – Atten­ded weekly liais­on meet­ings with the Park Author­ity Deputy Con­vener, CEO and Deputy CEO.
7. All meet­ings were in addi­tion to indi­vidu­al meet­ings and dis­cus­sions with Board mem­bers, seni­or officers, staff and oth­er stake­hold­er groups on a wide range of subjects.

Sandy Brem­ner, 13 Novem­ber 2025 Sandybremner@​cairngorms.​co.​uk