Formal board meeting - paper 5 and annex 1: corporate plan delivery update - 28 November 2025

Cairngorms Nation­al Park Authority

Form­al Board Paper 5

28 Novem­ber 2025

Page 1 of 11

For inform­a­tion

Title: Cor­por­ate plan deliv­ery update

Pre­pared by: Dav­id Camer­on, Deputy CEO and Dir­ect­or of Cor­por­ate Services

Pur­pose This paper draws the per­form­ance report for ²⁰²⁴⁄₂₅ against our cor­por­ate plan object­ives spe­cific­ally to the board’s atten­tion. This takes a more focused look at the Park Authority’s deliv­ery toward agreed stra­tegic object­ives in the con­text of the wider update on Cairngorms Nation­al Park Part­ner­ship Plan (NPPP) deliv­ery con­sidered by the board at its pre­vi­ous meet­ing. Formal-board-meeting-paper-3-Partnership-Plan-annual-update-26-September-2025.pdf and Formal-board-meeting-paper-3-annex-1-Partnership-Plan-annual-update-26-September-2025.pdf

Recom­mend­a­tions The Board is asked to:

a) To review the status of deliv­ery toward Cor­por­ate Plan object­ives as set out in the Per­form­ance Report included in the Annu­al Report.

b) To con­sider any actions needed to address deliv­ery of those Cor­por­ate Plan object­ives, par­tic­u­larly those cor­por­ate object­ives high­lighted as at increased deliv­ery risk.

Stra­tegic context

1. The Park Authority’s Cor­por­ate Plan for 2023 to 2027 sets out the organisation’s planned con­tri­bu­tions toward achieve­ment of the Cairngorms NPPP. The cor­por­ate plan estab­lishes the Park Authority’s agreed stra­tegic cor­por­ate object­ives for the peri­od to 2027. The Board con­sidered an update on the status of deliv­ery against the NPPP at its pre­vi­ous meet­ing in Septem­ber. This report now provides an update on deliv­ery of the Park Authority’s own dir­ect and indir­ect con­tri­bu­tions to the NPPP.

---

Cairngorms Nation­al Park Authority

Form­al Board Paper 5

28 Novem­ber 2025

Page 2 of 11

1. The Annu­al Report and Accounts for ²⁰²⁴⁄₂₅ is presen­ted as a sep­ar­ate item to this board meet­ing. Our Oper­at­ing Per­form­ance Sum­mary included in the annu­al report and accounts, set out in pages 24 to 42 of Annex 1 to paper 4, presents pro­gress over the course of the year in deliv­er­ing against our cor­por­ate plan stra­tegic object­ives. By nature of the Park Authority’s role – seek­ing to lead col­lab­or­at­ive effort in tack­ling the big issues for the Cairngorms – our per­form­ance meas­ures are rarely dir­ectly con­trol­lable by the Park Author­ity alone. Rather, they require col­lab­or­a­tion and engage­ment of the Park Author­ity and our part­ners. In this way, they act as meas­ures of the effect­ive­ness of our lead­er­ship and influ­en­cing abil­it­ies, com­bined with our own dir­ect invest­ment of fin­ance and staff resources, in tack­ling these priorities.

Stra­tegic policy consideration

1. Approv­al of the Annu­al Report and Accounts and the extern­al audit of the annu­al accounts is over­seen by the Audit and Risk Com­mit­tee on behalf of the board, as set out in the terms of ref­er­ence for the board’s com­mit­tees. The draft accounts, which remain sub­ject to clear­ance by the Aud­it­or Gen­er­al for Scot­land and lay­ing in Par­lia­ment, are presen­ted in full as a sep­ar­ate item to this board meeting.

2. The Oper­at­ing Per­form­ance Sum­mary referred to at para­graph 2 of this paper includes a dash­board ana­lys­is of deliv­ery against stra­tegic object­ives. This indic­ates wheth­er pro­gress has been broadly on track and meet­ing expect­a­tions (rated ​‘green’); or has exper­i­enced delay or some short­fall against object­ives which can be remedied before the end of the cor­por­ate plan peri­od (rated ​‘amber’). A ​‘red’ rat­ing would be used for any stra­tegic object­ives unlikely to be sub­stan­tially com­plete by the end of the cor­por­ate plan peri­od. There are no stra­tegic object­ives clas­si­fied as red at this stage. The per­form­ance dash­board has been rep­lic­ated at Annex 1 to this paper for ease of reference.

3. Atten­tion is drawn to the fact that the assess­ment of deliv­ery against stra­tegic object­ives is gen­er­ally the status as of the end of the pri­or fin­an­cial and oper­a­tion­al year, 31 March 2025. While some more cur­rent actions and res­ults may be reflec­ted, in gen­er­al some time has passed from the over­view of cor­por­ate deliv­ery pos­i­tion now presen­ted. Those object­ives high­lighted at some increased risks have been drawn out in the ​“Sup­port­ing Inform­a­tion” sec­tion of this paper and updates provided on cur­rent status.

---

Cairngorms Nation­al Park Authority

Form­al Board Paper 5

28 Novem­ber 2025

Page 3 of 11

Stake­hold­er engagement

1. As noted at the out­set of this paper, giv­en the nature of the Park Authority’s role – seek­ing to lead col­lab­or­at­ive effort in tack­ling the big issues for the Cairngorms – achieve­ment of our cor­por­ate object­ives typ­ic­ally requires the neces­sary col­lab­or­a­tion and engage­ment of our part­ners. The assess­ment of pro­gress against object­ives is made in con­text of the col­lab­or­at­ive work under­taken between the Park Author­ity and our deliv­ery part­ners. Fuller inform­a­tion on the part­ner­ship deliv­ery has been provided in the pre­vi­ous board meet­ing update on NPPP delivery.

Stra­tegic risk management

1. Our stra­tegic risk register has been developed to sup­port deliv­ery of the stra­tegic object­ives covered in the per­form­ance report. There are no new risk implic­a­tions arising from the over­view of cor­por­ate plan deliv­ery as of 31 March 2025. The stra­tegic risk register has been updated fol­low­ing the board’s recent hori­zon scan­ning dis­cus­sions and sub­sequently reviewed by the Audit and Risk Com­mit­tee at its meet­ing on 14 Novem­ber 2025.

Implic­a­tions

1. Our annu­al oper­a­tion­al plan and budget is estab­lished to give a bal­ance of invest­ment which will col­lect­ively achieve our stra­tegic object­ives. The evid­ence from ²⁰²⁴⁄₂₅ per­form­ance assess­ment sug­gests that the bal­ance of invest­ment has been appro­pri­ate in sup­port of the suc­cess­ful deliv­ery of the Park Authority’s wide range of stra­tegic objectives.

2. The Park Author­ity con­tin­ues to deliv­er against these stra­tegic object­ives over the course of ²⁰²⁵⁄₂₆. The Resources Com­mit­tee has reviewed the pos­i­tion of cur­rent year budget man­age­ment and noted that we remain on track from a fin­an­cial per­spect­ive to deliv­er a range of ini­ti­at­ives and invest­ments fur­ther pro­gress­ing these object­ives with­in a bal­anced budget position.

3. The implic­a­tions for cor­por­ate deliv­ery into ²⁰²⁶⁄₂₇ will be con­sidered with the board in Decem­ber 2025 to March 2026 as we devel­op budget and oper­a­tion­al plan pro­pos­als for ²⁰²⁶⁄₂₇ informed by the Scot­tish Government’s (SG) budget.

---

Cairngorms Nation­al Park Authority

Form­al Board Paper 5

28 Novem­ber 2025

Page 4 of 11

Suc­cess measures

1. The per­form­ance report dash­board com­prises a key ele­ment of the Park Authority’s cor­por­ate per­form­ance frame­work and suc­cess meas­ures. This gives a high-level stra­tegic over­view of pro­gress being made toward achieve­ment of agreed cor­por­ate plan objectives.

Sup­port­ing information

Update on cor­por­ate object­ives with escal­ated risk assessments

1. The major­ity of stra­tegic object­ives are assessed as on track for deliv­ery as expec­ted by the end of the cor­por­ate plan peri­od, March 2027.

2. At the end of ²⁰²³⁄₂₄ we repor­ted that the fol­low­ing object­ives were at heightened deliv­ery risk. Remedi­al action has now brought these aspects of our work back in line with our expectations.

a) A13 Spe­cies Recovery

1. Updates on the status of those ele­ments of cor­por­ate per­form­ance assessed as at some heightened deliv­ery risk at the end of ²⁰²⁴⁄₂₅ are provided below.

A5	Moor­land management	Increase the sus­tain­ab­il­ity of moor­land man­age­ment in the Nation­al Park to ensure great­er spe­cies and struc­tur­al diversity in moor­land areas of the Nation­al Park.

1. The Park Author­ity is now fund­ing numer­ous pro­jects with­in the East Cairngorm Moor­land Part­ner­ship area, includ­ing the cre­ation of deer fenced enclos­ures to pro­tect and allow regen­er­a­tion of aspen, wader sur­veys, ripari­an wood­land cre­ation pro­jects, rap­tor mon­it­or­ing and the estab­lish­ment of large woody struc­tures in some trib­u­tar­ies of the Dee. We expect this invest­ment in due course to con­trib­ute to a more pos­it­ive over­all pos­i­tion on our deliv­ery of our moor­land man­age­ment objectives.

2. A Park wide per­eg­rine sur­vey was under­taken in 2024 in col­lab­or­a­tion with Rap­tor Study Groups and land man­agers. The num­ber of per­eg­rines with­in the Nation­al Park in 2024 (31 pairs) was less than half the num­ber recor­ded in 2002, reflecting

---

Cairngorms Nation­al Park Authority

Form­al Board Paper 5

28 Novem­ber 2025

Page 5 of 11

long-term declines in the over­all Scot­tish pop­u­la­tion and pop­u­la­tions in upland areas in the UK. The mer­lin sur­vey will be com­pleted in 2026, this sur­vey along with the nation­al hen har­ri­er sur­vey and golden eagle mod­el­ling work will provide a com­plete pic­ture of the status of pri­or­ity rap­tor spe­cies in the man­aged uplands of the Park.

A6	Gamebird man­age­ment	Ensure that all pheas­ant and part­ridge shoots adhere to best prac­tice and that all gamebird releases are sus­tain­able and do not neg­at­ively impact on nat­ive biodiversity.

1. Work by Game and Wild­life Con­ser­va­tion Trust (GWCT) has estab­lished a baseline of the num­bers of gamebirds being released in the Nation­al Park and work will now focus on the impacts of releases on nat­ive biodiversity.

A12	Cairngorms Nature Index	Devel­op a more com­plete under­stand­ing of the Nation­al Park’s spe­cies, hab­it­ats and eco­sys­tems, and help mon­it­or long-term pro­gress through a ded­ic­ated Cairngorms Nature Index.

1. The Cairngorms Nature Index will provide a sci­en­tific­ally robust way of assess­ing the health of eco­sys­tems in the Nation­al Park. Pro­gress to devel­op the index has been slower than expec­ted due to a crit­ic­al long-term staff absence, with com­ple­tion now expec­ted dur­ing 2026.

B1	Work­ing age population	The pro­por­tion of young and work­ing age people in the Nation­al Park increases rel­at­ive to the total res­id­ent pop­u­la­tion, which remains stable.

1. The Cor­por­ate Plan actions that sup­port this stra­tegic object­ive are linked to the Park Authority’s role in the plan­ning sys­tem. The Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan (LDP) Evid­ence report pre­par­a­tion is nearly com­plete and with­in the times­cales set out in the Devel­op­ment Plan Scheme. Pro­gress has been delayed slightly because of uncer­tainty about the require­ments of the Evid­ence Gat­echeck pro­cess, giv­en the fail­ure of the major­ity of plan­ning author­it­ies’ sub­mis­sions so far. Staff are working

---

Cairngorms Nation­al Park Authority

Form­al Board Paper 5

28 Novem­ber 2025

Page 6 of 11

to ensure any les­sons from oth­er author­it­ies’ exper­i­ences are addressed pri­or to seek­ing Board approv­al to sub­mit the evid­ence report for the Gatecheck.

B10	A Park for All	Bet­ter oppor­tun­it­ies for every­one to enjoy the Nation­al Park and the vis­it­or pro­file will be more diverse.

1. The rat­ing is amber because the per­cent­age of black and glob­al eth­nic major­ity vis­it­ors to the Nation­al Park remains lower than the of the pop­u­la­tion of Scot­land. Nev­er­the­less, the Park Authority’s work with these groups has stepped up and the per­cent­age of vis­it­ors from these groups is slowly increasing.

C1	Access to housing	Ensure that there is suf­fi­cient afford­able hous­ing stock to enable people to live and work with­in the Nation­al Park.

C2	New hous­ing	Deliv­er new hous­ing in the Nation­al Park and ensure as much as pos­sible is secured for key work­ers and / or to resolve afford­ab­il­ity issues.

1. The Park Authority’s dir­ect role in the stra­tegic object­ives related to afford­able hous­ing and to new hous­ing is mainly through the plan­ning sys­tem and the Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan’s alloc­a­tions and policies as well as decisions on sig­ni­fic­ant plan­ning applic­a­tions for hous­ing. The cur­rent Devel­op­ment Plan com­prises the Nation­al Plan­ning Frame­work and the Cairngorms Nation­al Park Loc­al Devel­op­ment 2022 and it is only when a new LDP is adop­ted that the stra­tegic inten­tions of the NPPP will be trans­lated in to plan­ning policy.

C3	Hous­ing and com­munity benefit	Work with com­munit­ies to ensure that the major­ity of land alloc­ated for devel­op­ment around vil­lages and towns in the Nation­al Park is con­trolled by com­munit­ies or public

---

Cairngorms Nation­al Park Authority

Form­al Board Paper 5

28 Novem­ber 2025

Page 7 of 11

		bod­ies to help man­age long-term devel­op­ment needs.

1. Com­munity groups con­tin­ue to explore hous­ing pro­jects in a num­ber of com­munit­ies but in the con­text of uncer­tain future fund­ing from SG and rising costs for devel­op­ment. A ​“Call for sites and ideas” will be under­taken as part of the LDP pro­cess to help pro­mote this object­ive and help com­munit­ies start to think about the long term oppor­tun­it­ies and needs.

Dav­id Camer­on 05 Novem­ber 2025 davidcameron@​cairngorms.​co.​uk

---

Cairngorms Nation­al Park Authority

Form­al Board Paper 5 Annex 1

28 Novem­ber 2025

Page 8 of 11

Annex 1

Aim	Object­ive	RAG
Nature and climate
A1 Net Zero	Ensure the Cairngorms Nation­al Park reaches net zero as soon as pos­sible and con­trib­utes all it can to help­ing Scot­land meet its net zero commitments.
A2 Wood­land	Increase the amount of wood­land in the Nation­al Park to sup­port lar­ger, more nat­ur­al wood­lands, expand­ing in places up to a nat­ur­al treeline, provid­ing con­nec­tions across river catch­ments and around the cent­ral core of the mountains.
expan­sion
A3 Peat­land	Restore and man­age peat­land with­in the Nation­al Park to reduce car­bon emis­sions and improve biodiversity.
res­tor­a­tion
A4 Deer and	Reduce the neg­at­ive impacts of red deer and oth­er herb­i­vores across the Nation­al Park to enable wood­lands to expand, heath­er loss to be reversed, peat­lands to recov­er and wider biod­iversity and land­scape enhance­ments to take place.
herb­i­vore impacts
A5 Moor­land	Increase the sus­tain­ab­il­ity of moor­land man­age­ment in the Nation­al Park to ensure great­er spe­cies and struc­tur­al diversity in moor­land areas of the Nation­al Park.
man­age­ment
A6 Gamebird	Ensure that all pheas­ant and part­ridge shoots adhere to best prac­tice and that all gamebird releases are sus­tain­able and do not neg­at­ively impact on nat­ive biodiversity.
man­age­ment
A7 Fire	Ensure that all man­aged burn­ing (muir­burn) fol­lows best prac­tice as defined by the muir­burn licens­ing scheme, sup­port­ing hab­it­at res­tor­a­tion and recovery.
man­age­ment
A8 Farm­ing	Work with farms in the Nation­al Park to reduce their car­bon foot­print, con­serve soil car­bon, encour­age sus­tain­able pro­duc­tion and deliv­er increased biod­iversity on in-bye land.

---

Cairngorms Nation­al Park Authority

Form­al Board Paper 5 Annex 1

28 Novem­ber 2025

Page 9 of 11

Aim	Object­ive	RAG
A9 Fresh­wa­ter	Restore and con­nect rivers to thriv­ing wet­lands and flood­plains as part of a wider res­tor­a­tion of the Nation­al Park’s fresh­wa­ter sys­tems, help­ing mit­ig­ate the impacts of cli­mate change.
sys­tems
A10 Eco­lo­gic­al	Con­nect hab­it­ats and eco­sys­tems across all dif­fer­ent types of land use in the Nation­al Park to cre­ate an eco­lo­gic­al net­work, which will bring wider land­scape biod­iversity and people benefits.
net­work
A11 Eco­lo­gic­al	Improve eco­sys­tem func­tion­al­ity and resi­li­ence across the Nation­al Park by increas­ing the area of land man­aged prin­cip­ally for eco­lo­gic­al restoration.
res­tor­a­tion
A12 Cairngorms	Devel­op a more com­plete under­stand­ing of the Nation­al Park’s spe­cies, hab­it­ats and eco­sys­tems, and help mon­it­or long-term pro­gress through a ded­ic­ated Cairngorms Nature Index.
Nature Index
A13 Spe­cies	Ensure spe­cies thrive in the Nation­al Park with key assemblages across the Cairngorms with­in the semi-nat­ur­al landscape.
recov­ery
A14 Green	Use private green invest­ment in the Nation­al Park to fund nature’s recov­ery and share the bene­fits between com­munit­ies, landown­ers, work­ers and wider society.
invest­ment
People
B1 Work­ing age	The pro­por­tion of young and work­ing-age people in the Nation­al Park increases rel­at­ive to the total res­id­ent pop­u­la­tion, which remains stable.
pop­u­la­tion
B2 Well­being	Devel­op a well­being eco­nomy that deliv­ers social justice in a healthy eco­sys­tem, draw­ing on the spe­cial nat­ur­al and cul­tur­al qual­it­ies of the Cairngorms.
eco­nomy
B3 Real living	Increase the num­ber of Real Liv­ing Wage employ­ers in the Nation­al Park.
wage
B4 Skills and	Increase skills and train­ing oppor­tun­it­ies for people in the Nation­al Park to meet busi­ness needs and ensure oppor­tun­it­ies cre­ated by the growth in green jobs can be filled by res­id­ents and under-rep­res­en­ted groups.
train­ing

---

Cairngorms Nation­al Park Authority

Form­al Board Paper 5 Annex 1

28 Novem­ber 2025

Page 10 of 11

Aim	Object­ive	RAG
B5 Com­munity	Increase the num­ber of assets in com­munity own­er­ship or man­age­ment, the num­ber of social enter­prises that gen­er­ate a profit and the area of land where com­munit­ies are involved in man­age­ment decisions.
assets and land
B6 New	Strengthen the par­ti­cip­a­tion struc­tures that sup­port plan­ning and decision-mak­ing at a loc­al level.
approaches to citizen
par­ti­cip­a­tion
B7 Com­munity-led	Com­munit­ies have up- to-date com­munity action plans and are sup­por­ted by a com­munity-led loc­al devel­op­ment fund­ing pro­gramme, deliv­er­ing the Nation­al Park Part­ner­ship Plan.
plan­ning and
devel­op­ment
B8 Gael­ic	Encour­age great­er use of Gael­ic in the Nation­al Park.
lan­guage and culture
B9 Men­tal & Physical	Green Health refer­ral pro­grammes in place in all GP practices
Health
B10 A Park for All	Bet­ter oppor­tun­it­ies for every­one to enjoy the Nation­al Park and the vis­it­or pro­file will be more diverse.
B11 Volun­teer­ing &	At least 200 volun­teer rangers by 2030. Increase num­ber of volun­teer days every year
Out­door Learning
Place
C1 Access to housing	Ensure that there is suf­fi­cient afford­able hous­ing stock to enable people to live and work with­in the Nation­al Park.
C2 New housing	Deliv­er new hous­ing in the Nation­al Park and ensure as much as pos­sible is secured for key work­ers and / or to resolve afford­ab­il­ity issues.
C3 Hous­ing and community	Work with com­munit­ies to ensure that the major­ity of land alloc­ated for devel­op­ment around vil­lages and towns in the Nation­al Park is con­trolled by com­munit­ies or pub­lic bod­ies to help man­age long-term devel­op­ment needs.
bene­fit

---

Cairngorms Nation­al Park Authority

Form­al Board Paper 5 Annex 1

28 Novem­ber 2025

Page 11 of 11

Aim	Object­ive	RAG
C4 Vil­lage and town	Ensure vil­lages and town centres in the Nation­al Park are thriv­ing places where people live, shop and meet.
centres
C5 Vis­it­ors to the	Work to sta­bil­ise vis­it­or num­bers in the peak sea­son, focus­ing growth on quieter months and on those areas that have the infra­struc­ture and capa­city to man­age for addi­tion­al visitors.
Nation­al Park	Max­im­ise the eco­nom­ic and com­munity bene­fit of tour­ism by encour­aging longer stays, while main­tain­ing exist­ing high levels of vis­it­or satisfaction.
C6 A sustainable	Secure the Nation­al Park’s repu­ta­tion as an inter­na­tion­al exem­plar in sus­tain­able tour­ism and the man­age­ment of pro­tec­ted areas.
des­tin­a­tion
C7 Trans­port to and	Pro­mote a mod­al shift towards sus­tain­able and act­ive travel in the way vis­it­ors and com­muters get to, and every­one moves around, the Nation­al Park.
around the Park
C8 Access­ible path	Improve path, cycle and out­door access net­works to give out­stand­ing oppor­tun­it­ies to exper­i­ence the nat­ur­al and cul­tur­al her­it­age of the Nation­al Park to the widest range of people, while min­im­ising dis­turb­ance to vul­ner­able spe­cies, hab­it­ats and
and cycle network	sites.
C9 High-qual­ity visitor	Wel­come vis­it­ors and provide a high-qual­ity exper­i­ence while man­aging their impacts through provid­ing bet­ter infra­struc­ture and high-qual­ity ranger services.
exper­i­ence
C10 Cul­tur­al heritage	Safe­guard and pro­mote the Park’s cul­tur­al her­it­age and provide oppor­tun­it­ies for every­one to exper­i­ence and learn about the Nation­al Park’s out­stand­ing his­tor­ic envir­on­ment, his­tory and culture.