Formal board meeting - paper 4 annex 1: annual report and accounts 2024/25 - 28 November 2025

Cairngorms Nation­al Park Author­ity Ugh­dar­ras Pàirc Nàiseanta a’ Mhon­aidh Ruaidh

Annu­al report and accounts ²⁰²⁴⁄₂₅ …an out­stand­ing nation­al park, enjoyed and val­ued by every­one, where nature and people thrive together…

AITH­ISG BHLIADH­NAIL AGUS CUN­NTAS­AN ²⁰²⁴⁄₂₅ …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…

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Laid before the Scot­tish Par­lia­ment by the Cab­in­et Sec­ret­ary for Rur­al Affairs, Land Reform and Islands, in pur­su­ance of Sec­tion 26 of the Nation­al Parks (Scot­land) Act 2000. The Annu­al Report and Accounts 2024 – 25 are being laid before Scot­tish Par­lia­ment by the Cab­in­et Sec­ret­ary for Rur­al Affairs, Land Reform and Islands in pur­su­ance of Sec­tion 22(5) of the Pub­lic Fin­ance and Account­ab­il­ity (Scot­land) Act 2000.

SG/2025/231: Cairngorms Nation­al Park Author­ity Report and Accounts ²⁰²⁴⁄₂₅

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CON­TENTS

1 PER­FORM­ANCE REPORT	Page
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 2024⁄25 and beyond	13
1.5 Key issues and Risks	16
1.6 Fin­an­cial Per­form­ance Summary	18
1.7 Oper­at­ing Per­form­ance Summary	24

2 ACCOUNT­AB­IL­ITY REPORT
2.1 Gov­ernance Report	45
2.1.1 Dir­ect­ors’ Report	45
2.1.2 State­ment of Nation­al Park Authority’s Responsibilities	51
2.1.3 State­ment of Board’s Responsibilities	51
2.1.4 State­ment of the Account­able Officer’s Responsibilities	52
2.2 Gov­ernance Statement	53
2.3 Remu­ner­a­tion Report and Key Inform­a­tion on Staff	63
2.4 Par­lia­ment­ary Account­ab­il­ity Disclosures	83
2.5 Inde­pend­ent Auditor’s Report to the Mem­bers of the
Cairngorms Nation­al Park Authority,
the Aud­it­or Gen­er­al for Scot­land and the Scot­tish Government	85

3 FIN­AN­CIAL STATEMENTS
3.1 State­ment of Com­pre­hens­ive Net Expenditure	89
3.2 State­ment of Fin­an­cial Position	90
3.3 State­ment of Cash Flows	91
3.4 State­ment of Changes in Tax­pay­ers’ Equity	92
3.5 Notes to the Fin­an­cial Statements	93

|APPENDIX 1 Accounts Dir­ec­tion |116 |

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1 PER­FORM­ANCE REPORT

PER­FORM­ANCE OVER­VIEW Cairngorms Nation­al Park Author­ity presents this Annu­al Report and Accounts for the year from 1 April 2024 to 31 March 2025 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 Body Spon­sor­ing body Envir­on­ment and Forestry Dir­ect­or­ate, Nat­ur­al Resources Divi­sion, Scot­tish Gov­ern­ment The Board The Nation­al Park Author­ity Board is made up of nine­teen Board mem­bers: (1) five elec­ted by the com­munity, (2) sev­en appoin­ted by Scot­tish Min­is­ters, and (3) sev­en appoin­ted fol­low­ing nom­in­a­tions by the Loc­al Authorities.

The Board is led by the Con­vener and Deputy Con­vener. Mem­bers in ²⁰²⁴⁄₂₅ from each of these three appoint­ment routes are:

Board mem­bers (1) Kenny Deans (ward 1) Paul Gibb (ward 5) John Kirk (ward 3) Lauren Mac­Cal­lum (ward 2) Elean­or Mack­in­tosh (ward 4), Deputy Convener

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(2) Sandy Brem­ner, Con­vener Jack­ie Brier­ton (appoin­ted 1/06/2024) Peter Cos­grove Han­nah Grist Dr Fiona McLean Steve Mickle­wright Duncan Miller

(3) Chris Beat­tie (Angus) (resigned 13/06/2025) Geva Black­ett (Aber­deen­shire) Rus­sell Jones (High­land) Bill Lob­ban (High­land) Xan­der McDade (Perth & Kinross, resigned 30/09/24) Anne Ross (Aber­deen­shire) Derek Ross (Moray) Michael Wil­li­ams (Perth & Kinross, appoin­ted 30/09/2024)

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 com­pris­ing 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 – retired 15 April 2024 Andy Ford — Nature and Cli­mate Gav­in Miles – Plan­ning and Place – appoin­ted 1 May 2024

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1.2 Chief Executive’s For­ward I have pleas­ure in present­ing the Cairngorms Nation­al Park Authority’s Annu­al Report and Accounts cov­er­ing the year from 1 April 2024 to 31 March 2025.

2024 – 25 was the first full year of deliv­ery through the Cairngorms 2030 pro­gramme. This ambi­tious pro­gramme will see the Cairngorms become the UK’s first net zero nation­al park, turn­ing all the talk about tack­ling cli­mate change into pos­it­ive action on the ground. Made up of 20 long-term and impact­ful pro­jects, Cairngorms 2030 is on a big­ger scale than any­thing pre­vi­ously attemp­ted in the UK. With over 80 part­ners involved, and more than £42 mil­lion of fund­ing, we’re focussed on deliv­er­ing the trans­form­a­tion­al changes neces­sary to achieve our col­lect­ive cli­mate and nature responsibilities.

The pro­gramme is already mak­ing a dif­fer­ence. Dur­ing the year, two com­munity deer lar­ders were estab­lished, tak­ing ven­ison from the field and provid­ing it to loc­al food­banks, provid­ing bene­fit to both the com­munity and the land. We made major strides in our peat­land res­tor­a­tion work, restor­ing 2,100 hec­tares. Our focus on green health led to the launch of a nature pre­scrip­tions ser­vice in part­ner­ship with the NHS and the cre­ation of the UK’s first Out­door Demen­tia Resource Centre in part­ner­ship with Alzheimer Scot­land. People liv­ing with demen­tia and their carers benefited from the ser­vice more than 1,000 times dur­ing the past 12 months. Cairngorms 2030 is sup­por­ted by The Nation­al Lot­tery Her­it­age Fund, with thanks to play­ers of the Nation­al Lottery.

At the heart of our work is engage­ment with the com­munity in the Nation­al Park and I’m proud of the extens­ive engage­ment car­ried out by my col­leagues, both through Cairngorms 2030 and as part of our core work. Park Author­ity staff have atten­ded vari­ous events this year includ­ing the Grant­own Show, con­fer­ences on peat­land res­tor­a­tion and wild­fire man­age­ment, and events run by the Cairngorms Busi­ness Part­ner­ship. In Septem­ber 2024, we hos­ted Your Future Here, a rur­al skills and careers event atten­ded by hun­dreds of young people from across the Nation­al Park, with the sup­port of more than 30 part­ner organ­isa­tions. We also hos­ted com­munity coun­cil and devel­op­ment trust gath­er­ings in Boat of Garten and Bal­later, bring­ing togeth­er rep­res­ent­at­ives from across the Nation­al Park to dis­cuss shared issues and explore col­lab­or­a­tion opportunities.

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The Park Author­ity has been enga­ging extens­ively with the land man­age­ment com­munity in the devel­op­ment of the UK’s first Integ­rated Wild­fire Man­age­ment Plan. This plan pro­motes col­lab­or­a­tion between land man­agers, pub­lic agen­cies and oth­ers to reduce wild­fire risk, respond effect­ively to wild­fires and mit­ig­ate their impacts on the land­scape. Our pro­pos­al for a sea­son­al fire man­age­ment byelaw was sub­mit­ted to Scot­tish Gov­ern­ment for con­firm­a­tion in March 2025 fol­low­ing extens­ive pub­lic engage­ment and we have had many suc­cess­ful pro­jects through our Cli­mate Adapt­a­tion Fund includ­ing on wild­fire management.

The Park Author­ity has also been con­sult­ing on the next Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan as we look to com­plete the Evid­ence Review for sub­mis­sion to the Report­er. Sur­veys of res­id­ents and vis­it­ors were car­ried out – the former for the very first time — provid­ing us with a wealth of data; and the Well-being Eco­nomy Action Plan was agreed.

Pion­eer­ing con­ser­va­tion work took place through­out the year, under­pinned by the com­ple­tion of the Cairngorms Nature Action Plan (2019−2024). Among the high­lights were the safe arrival of the first beaver kits in the Cairngorms for 400 years a sure sign beaver pairs are thriv­ing after the care­ful selec­tion of suit­able release sites. We’ve been work­ing closely with part­ners to safe­guard oth­er pre­cious spe­cies, from the Caper­cail­lie Emer­gency Plan to our part­ner­ship work on fresh­wa­ter pearl mussels.

Ongo­ing chal­lenges around reform and fin­ance across the pub­lic sec­tor are def­in­itely some­thing for us to nav­ig­ate as an organ­isa­tion; how­ever, with Cairngorms 2030 now in full flow and an excel­lent fin­an­cial set­tle­ment in place for 2025 – 26, it feels as though we can approach the next 12 months with confidence.

The Park Author­ity is work­ing closely with all its part­ners to ensure that nature and people thrive togeth­er in this very spe­cial Nation­al Park. Goal la Grant Moir Chief Exec­ut­ive and Account­able Officer 14 Novem­ber 2025

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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 co- oper­a­tion 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 the 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. The cur­rent NPPP spans the 5 years from 2022 to 2027; it 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 2022 – 27. The Cor­por­ate Plan for the peri­od 2023 – 27 was approved by the Board at its meet­ing on 24 March 2023, and by Scot­tish Min­is­ters on 29 June 2023. 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, Pub­lic Sec­tor Reform Strategy, and oth­er rel­ev­ant nation­al strategies.

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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 prin­ciples, 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 prin­ciples – the Park Authority’s prin­ciples are: • Pas­sion and ded­ic­a­tion • Com­munity • Pion­eer­ing • Inspir­ing leadership

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.

We will con­tin­ue to build on our Organ­isa­tion­al Devel­op­ment Strategy to embed a high-per­form­ance, high-achiev­ing and high-qual­ity cul­ture that is focused on its staff, our organ­isa­tion­al prin­ciples, and on equal­it­ies. 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.

Aims and object­ives The Park authority’s object­ives for the year were formed around the themes of Nature & Cli­mate, People, and Place:

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Nature & cli­mate Wood­land expan­sion Peat­land res­tor­a­tion Nature res­tor­a­tion: • fresh­wa­ter res­tor­a­tion • rap­tor con­ser­va­tion • caper­cail­lie con­ser­va­tion • re-intro­duc­tion of species

People Cre­ation of paths and long-dis­tance routes Pro­vi­sion of ranger ser­vices Improve­ment of vis­it­or infra­struc­ture For­mu­lat­ing approaches to act­ive travel

Place Mon­it­or­ing the Cairngorms Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan Deliv­er­ing hous­ing Con­trib­ut­ing to the devel­op­ment of the well­being eco­nomy plan Cre­ation of a sus­tain­able tour­ism action plan

In addi­tion to deliv­ery of our estab­lished object­ives, we con­tin­ue to give stra­tegic focus to our work towards a sus­tain­able nature-based, eco­nomy in the Cairngorms, while at the same time, deliv­er­ing urgent action to address cli­mate change.

Per­form­ance against these object­ives was strong. Work began on three wood­land cre­ation pro­jects, and 2,100 hec­tares of peat­land were restored. Extens­ive con­sulta­tion was under­taken, both with the com­munity and with the part­ners to the Nation­al Park Part­ner­ship Plan, on a range of issues includ­ing fire man­age­ment, farm­ing and land­scape-scale land and water man­age­ment. Sub­stan­tial path works were car­ried out and ranger ser­vices were act­ive sup­port­ing vis­it­ors through­out the year. The ranger team was aug­men­ted by sea­son­al staff and appren­tices between April and Octo­ber. Deliv­ery of the Cairngorms 2030 pro­gramme, fun­ded by the Nation­al Lot­tery Her­it­age Fund (NLHF), com­pleted its first full year of activ­ity, and the caper­cail­lie pro­ject, also fun­ded by NLHF, was com­pleted. Beavers, intro­duced to the Park dur­ing 2023, are thriving.

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The scale of the Park Authority’s sphere of oper­a­tions con­tin­ues to expand, togeth­er with the fin­an­cing and work­force required to deliv­er the object­ives agreed with our fun­ders. Over­all, the Park Authority’s respons­ib­il­ity for funds under man­age­ment, primar­ily made avail­able by Scot­tish Gov­ern­ment, increased from £14.5m in ²⁰²³⁄₂₄ to £14.7m in ²⁰²⁴⁄₂₅.

Look­ing For­ward This dynam­ic, respons­ive organ­isa­tion­al eth­os will con­tin­ue. The Park Author­ity will con­tin­ue to look at new ways of oper­at­ing that deliv­er our com­mit­ments in the cur­rent Nation­al Park Part­ner­ship Plan. This will include con­tinu­ing our suc­cess in look­ing for altern­at­ive fund­ing oppor­tun­it­ies, includ­ing applic­a­tions to funds such as the Nation­al Lot­tery Her­it­age Fund, and spon­sor­ship oppor­tun­it­ies. It also includes col­lab­or­at­ing with part­ners to deliv­er improved ser­vices. We con­tin­ue to strive for more effi­cient, and sus­tain­able intern­al work­ing prac­tices through deliv­er­ing against our Organ­isa­tion­al Devel­op­ment Strategy.

Fund­ing for ²⁰²⁵⁄₂₆ from Scot­tish Gov­ern­ment – grant-in-aid, fund­ing for peat­land res­tor­a­tion and for nature res­tor­a­tion — has increased by £2m over that awar­ded for ²⁰²⁴⁄₂₅, allow­ing the Park Author­ity to expand its deliv­ery, par­tic­u­larly in respect of nature res­tor­a­tion and con­ser­va­tion. Over ²⁰²⁵⁄₂₆, we will fur­ther build our capa­city to deliv­er peat­land res­tor­a­tion and, through this work, act on cli­mate change. The Sea­son­al Ranger Ser­vice will con­tin­ue for a fifth year, while we aug­ment this sup­port for vis­it­ors with cap­it­al invest­ment in vis­it­or infrastructure.

In ²⁰²³⁄₂₄ we were awar­ded £10.8 mil­lion by the Nation­al Lot­tery Her­it­age Fund (NLHF) to deliv­er the Cairngorms 2030 Pro­gramme. This is a 5‑year pro­ject that will deliv­er £42m of activ­ity in the Park. Pro­jects cov­er con­ser­va­tion, rur­al regen­er­a­tion, access, and sus­tain­able trans­port, amongst oth­er areas of work. ²⁰²⁵⁄₂₆ will be the second full year of the pro­ject, which com­menced in mid- Janu­ary of 2024, and will con­tin­ue until Janu­ary 2029.

Our budget for the ²⁰²⁵⁄₂₆ fin­an­cial year, approved by the Board in March 2025, provides total funds under man­age­ment for the year ahead of £19.3m: a fore­cast increase of £4.4m over ²⁰²⁴⁄₂₅ level.

Per­form­ance monitoring

The vari­ous aspects of the Park Authority’s per­form­ance – fin­an­cial, organ­isa­tion­al, and oper­a­tion­al — are repor­ted over the course of the year to the

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Authority’s Board and its sub-com­mit­tees. These reports are avail­able on our web­site Cairngorms | Meetings.

By the nature of the Park Authority’s role, in seek­ing to lead col­lab­or­at­ive effort to tackle the big issues for the Cairngorms, per­form­ance is rarely entirely con­trol­lable by the Park Author­ity. Rather, achieve­ment of object­ives requires effect­ive lead­er­ship and influ­en­cing, and col­lab­or­a­tion and engage­ment with our part­ners, com­bined with our dir­ect invest­ment of fin­ance and staff resources, to address our priorities.

Risk man­age­ment Risk man­age­ment, togeth­er with con­sid­er­a­tion of issues arising that may impact the deliv­ery of our stra­tegic cor­por­ate pri­or­it­ies, is cent­ral to our man­age­ment activ­it­ies with­in the Park Author­ity. The Man­age­ment Team reviews stra­tegic risks at least quarterly, and we have developed and embed­ded risk man­age­ment prac­tices, togeth­er with pro­ject man­age­ment pro­cesses, to take full cog­nis­ance of these core aspects of effect­ive organ­isa­tion­al and stra­tegic con­trol arrangements.

The Park Authority’s Stra­tegic Risk Man­age­ment Strategy and asso­ci­ated Stra­tegic Risk Register, in tan­dem with our cor­por­ate per­form­ance and mon­it­or­ing sys­tem, details the key issues and risks around deliv­ery of our Cor­por­ate Plan togeth­er with the stra­tegic object­ives and key per­form­ance indic­at­ors set out in that plan. The Board receives detailed reports and com­ments on key issues and risks twice annu­ally, with the Board’s Audit and Risk Com­mit­tee review­ing stra­tegic risk man­age­ment between these Board meetings.

Sig­ni­fic­ant pro­jects also have their own embed­ded risk registers and risk mit­ig­a­tion plans, for example, we have estab­lished sep­ar­ate risk registers to sup­port the deliv­ery of the Cairngorms 2030 Pro­gramme. More inform­a­tion on risk and intern­al con­trols can be found in the Gov­ernance State­ment with­in this doc­u­ment and in our Risk Man­age­ment Strategy.

The key risks faced by the Park Author­ity included: • Fin­an­cial resources: in-year adjust­ments to fund­ing provided by Scot­tish Gov­ern­ment; delay in the pro­vi­sion of match fund­ing to sup­port key aspects of our Cairngorms 2030 pro­gramme; dif­fi­culties in plan­ning future pro­grammes with­in the con­text of poten­tial fin­an­cial con­straints. We con­tin­ue to liaise with Scot­tish Gov­ern­ment through our spon­sor­ship team

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• and the Peat­land Action Team, high­light­ing our achieve­ments and align­ing our deliv­ery to the aims of the Gov­ern­ment. Our cor­por­ate plan is pri­or­it­ised around anti­cip­ated Scot­tish Gov­ern­ment budget alloc­a­tions and includes mit­ig­a­tion against expec­ted fund­ing con­straints. We con­tin­ue to sup­port part­ners such as Cairngorms Nature and the Cairngorms Trust in secur­ing inward invest­ment. • Oper­a­tion­al devel­op­ment: provid­ing cor­por­ate sys­tems suf­fi­cient to sup­port the speed of organ­isa­tion­al change in the organ­isa­tion. Recruit­ment of spe­cial­ist staff has enabled the improve­ment of intern­al con­trol sys­tems; digit­isa­tion of sys­tems has improved effi­ciency. • Tech­nic­al issues: cyber-secur­ity issues with asso­ci­ated threats of fraud and theft. We carry out daily review of the Scot­tish Cyber Coordin­a­tion Centre threat sum­mar­ies and take appro­pri­ate fol­low up action. Dur­ing the year we achieved Cyber-secur­ity plus accred­it­a­tion and have taken part in a pilot pro­ject, run by Scot­tish Gov­ern­ment, in col­lab­or­a­tion with HEFEST­IS, to bench­mark and devel­op the matur­ity of our secur­ity sys­tems. • Repu­ta­tion­al issues: the good repu­ta­tion of the Author­ity as a found­a­tion for col­lab­or­a­tion with stake­hold­ers. We man­age stake­hold­er expect­a­tions through: • Tar­geted com­mu­nic­a­tions • Fur­ther devel­op­ment of stake­hold­er rela­tion­ships. • Devel­op­ment / strength­en­ing of stra­tegic part­ner­ships. • Ongo­ing assess­ment of oper­a­tion­al risk man­age­ment and mit­ig­a­tion in our communications.

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PER­FORM­ANCE REPORT: PER­FORM­ANCE ANA­LYS­IS This sec­tion provides inform­a­tion on the per­form­ance of the organ­isa­tion over the year ended 31 March 2025, our aims and pri­or­it­ies, our achieve­ments and fin­an­cial results.

1.4 Stra­tegic Aims and Pri­or­it­ies ²⁰²⁴⁄₂₅ 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.

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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 these 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.

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• Sup­port and con­trib­ute to Scot­tish Gov­ern­ment stra­tegic deliv­ery, includ­ing on Pub­lic Sec­tor Reform and long-term resource planning.

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.

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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. Unreal­ist­ic expect­a­tions of what the Park Author­ity and its part­ners can achieve in the face of the sig­ni­fic­ant risks presen­ted by cli­mate change, spe­cies extinc­tion, flood man­age­ment and fire are being man­aged through com­mu­nic­a­tion and collaboration.

Fin­an­cial resources The Scot­tish Government’s con­tin­ued con­cerns on for­ward sta­bil­ity of cur­rent fin­an­cial alloc­a­tions means that the risk of in-year adjust­ments, and uncer­tainty over future year fund­ing levels con­tin­ue to be key risks for the Park Author­ity. While we acknow­ledge that con­straints on pub­lic sec­tor fin­ances may restrict our capa­city to alloc­ate suf­fi­cient resources to deliv­er the cor­por­ate plan and may also affect the avail­ab­il­ity of part­ner­ship fund­ing for shared activ­it­ies, the favour­able fund­ing alloc­a­tions awar­ded for ²⁰²⁵⁄₂₆ give cause for optim­ism that we have a secure basis for deliv­ery through the remainder of the cur­rent Cor­por­ate Plan to March 2027 and beyond.

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. These pro­jects are enabling the Park Author­ity to extend its influ­ence by tak­ing on new types of work. The Author­ity is work­ing to improve the know­ledge and skills of col­leagues con­trib­ut­ing to these new activ­it­ies. Pay pres­sures are being man­aged in line with Scot­tish Gov­ern­ment policy, and in col­lab­or­a­tion with staff and unions.

We recog­nise that the Authority’s increas­ing breadth of activ­ity and range of extern­al fin­ance carry a stra­tegic risk that future organ­isa­tion­al work­force require­ments will be sig­ni­fic­antly dif­fer­ent to the struc­ture that is cur­rently in place. A revised work­force man­age­ment strategy is in devel­op­ment and, when agreed, will guide the man­age­ment and evol­u­tion of our staff group over the com­ing years.

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Tech­nic­al issues The Author­ity recog­nises its 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.

Repu­ta­tion The Park Author­ity acknow­ledges the import­ance of its rela­tion­ships with stake­hold­ers. Much of the Authority’s work is car­ried out in part­ner­ship with organ­isa­tions and com­munit­ies with­in the Park and the good repu­ta­tion of the Author­ity is a found­a­tion for this col­lab­or­a­tion. Our com­mu­nic­a­tions strategy and plans are developed to man­age the sens­it­iv­ity and nuances of our rela­tion­ships as these impact our repu­ta­tion. An oper­a­tion­al risk register focused on our repu­ta­tion and com­mu­nic­a­tion risks sup­ports our effect­ive man­age­ment of the repu­ta­tion and risk asso­ci­ated with this work.

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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 the Frame­work Agree­ment made with Scot­tish Gov­ern­ment, 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 Frame­work which com­pleted in June 2024, and the deliv­ery phase of Cairngorms 2030 where work began in Janu­ary 2024.

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 (cap­it­al­ised tan­gible and intan­gible assets), togeth­er with 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 ²⁰²⁴⁄₂₅ (includ­ing fund­ing for peat­land res­tor­a­tion) was again favour­able and increased in total by £0.610m. The resource alloc­a­tion increased by £0.316m, while cap­it­al increased by £0.294m. The Peat­land cap­it­al grant drawn down in the year was vol­un­tar­ily reduced by £0.380m; a suc­cess­ful year’s peat­land res­tor­a­tion pro­gramme cost less than anticipated.

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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 approved by the Board on 22 March 2024.

Income and expendit­ure	Out­turn	Budget	Vari­ance
	£’000	£’000	£’000
Income
Grant-in-aid Resource funding	7,394	7,394	-
Grant-in-aid Resource fund­ing peatland	580	580	-
Grant-in-aid Cap­it­al fund­ing general	1,810	1,810
Grant-in-aid Cap­it­al fund­ing peat­land recovery	2,458	3,000	(542)
Work­ing cap­it­al require­ment for reg­u­lar lease payments	(122)	(122)
Grant-in-aid Cap­it­al fund­ing nature recovery		450	(450)
Grant from spon­sor­ing department	12,120	13,112	(992)
Com­munity Led Loc­al Devel­op­ment (CLLD)	460	300	160
Cairngorms Caper­cail­lie pro­ject (NLHF)	280	280
Cairngorms 2030 (NLHF)	1,480	2,240	(760)
Oth­er oper­a­tion­al income	188	190	(2)
Total oth­er gen­er­ated income*	2,408	3,010	(602)
Total oper­at­ing income	14,528	16,122	(1,594)
Expendit­ure
Staff and Board costs**	6,543	6,933	390
Run­ning costs	905	948	43
Oper­a­tion­al plan delivery	3,046	2,963	(83)
Peat­land restoration	2,387	3,050	663
Nature Res­tor­a­tion	364	300	(64)