Richard Benyon: 'National parks are most treasured landscapes enjoyed by millions of people every year'

Two of England’s national parks will hold pilot direct elections for members under a package of changes announced today by the Department for the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs that signals a move to increased local power on parks’ governing bodies.

The coalition Government also proposes to limit national authority membership to a maximum of eight years, under changes announced by Natural Environment Minister Richard Benyon.

Local authorities will no longer be required to maintain a political balance to appointees to England’s nine national park governing bodies, plus the Broads authority, and it ordered the sparsely populated Northumberland national park to reduce the number of members on its authority.

Mr Benyon said: “Our national parks are our most treasured landscapes enjoyed by millions of people every year and contribute significantly to regional economies. The changes we are making will give the local communities a greater say in how their national park is managed.”

The changes are expected to come into effect from April 2013, following further consultation. Changes in the law will be necessary for some of the proposals, which the Government said meet the pledge made in the Coalition Agreement to review the governance arrangements of national parks to increase local accountability.

In addition, anyone who lives in the Lake District and North York Moors will now be eligible to take a parish seat on the national park authority. These seats were previously reserved for parish councillors.

Local elections will be held in the New Forest and Peak District national parks for people to vote directly for members of the authorities. A proportion of all members will be appointed through the new system in pilots will last for four years.

The Campaign for National Parks welcomed the measures which, it said, give local residents more say in the running of the parks.

A spokesperson for the organisation said: “Encouragingly, the Government continues to recognise national parks as our most treasured landscapes, managed by independent authorities to maximise the benefits that we all derive from these special areas.”

But the CNP cautioned that the national interest in the parks should be maintained. “The Government has decided to pilot direct elections in the New Forest and Peak District National Parks,” it said. “While this will provide useful experience of operating direct elections, it will be important to ensure that the national perspective in national park authorities is not undermined.

“The Government has also decided to remove the requirement on councils to apply a political balance when appointing three or more members to a national park authority. We will be responding to the forthcoming consultation on this to ensure that appropriate safeguards are in place to prevent national park authorities from becoming politicised.”

The Northumberland National Park Authority said reducing its membership to levels suggested by Defra could cause problems.

Chairman John Riddle said: “The authority carefully considered a reduction in the number of member representatives following the national and local consultation exercises in February 2011 and concluded that a reduction below 18 members would be problematic for the effective operation of the authority.

“We will, however, give full consideration to options for further reduction in the number of members in the context of reviewing our governance structures and will provide a full response to the minister on what we feel could be feasible whilst adhering to the principle of good governance.”

The Northumberland authority said it appeared there was little call for directly elected members. “The vast majority of responses from our local public consultation did not demonstrate an appetite for direct elections in Northumberland. However, it is understood that enabling legislation will allow for the pilot to be extended to all parks in future if deemed appropriate,” it said.

National parks in Wales and Scotland are the subject of devolved government and therefore did not come under the Defra review.