URGENT: The Clock is Ticking - Protect the Future of the North Pennines

Key Takeaway: Urgently respond by 10th February to defend active moorland management and reject the draft plan's dangerous rewilding proposals.

We are now just days away from a critical deadline that will shape the future of our uplands for years to come. The consultation on the North Pennines National Landscape (AONB) Management Plan (2026–2031) closes on 10th February.

If you live, work, or care about the North Pennines, you cannot afford to sit this one out.

The Management Plan is not just a paperwork exercise. It is the strategic blueprint that will guide decisions, funding, and priorities for this landscape for the next five years.

Currently the draft plan leans worryingly towards a philosophy of "rewilding" and passive management, often ignoring the practical realities of what keeps our moors healthy, safe, and thriving.

We know that the best outcomes for nature and people come from active management. It is the hard work of gamekeepers, farmers, and land managers that maintains the open vistas, protects rare wildlife, and supports the rural economy.

If we stay silent, we risk a plan that sidelines this essential work. We need your voice to ensure the final plan reflects reality, not just theory.

We have written a comprehensive consultation response on behalf of the Moorland Association and have also produced a shorter summary version.

What is at Stake?

The current draft proposes significant shifts in how the land is managed. While we share the ambition to recover nature and tackle climate change, we strongly disagree on how to get there.

The prevailing wind in this draft suggests that nature takes care of itself if left alone.

Those of us on the ground know differently. Without skilled intervention, we lose our wading birds to predation. Without fuel load management, we lose our peat to wildfire. Without supporting the rural economy, we lose the community fabric that holds these remote places together.

We need a Management Plan that supports the people who manage the land, rather than tying their hands.

Our Core Concerns: What You Need to Say

When you respond to the consultation, your own words are always best. However, we urge all members and supporters to reinforce the following four critical points. These are the areas where the draft plan is most dangerous to the future of the moorlands.

1. Wildfire Risk: We Must Keep Our Toolkit

The draft plan proposes an end to prescribed burning on peat. We strongly disagree.

As climate change leads to hotter, drier summers, the risk of devastating wildfires is rising.

Prescribed, "cool" burning is a vital tool for reducing the fuel load (old heather and vegetation) in a controlled manner. If you remove this tool, fuel builds up. When a wildfire eventually strikes - whether from lightning or a discarded BBQ - it burns hotter, deeper, and harder.

• The Reality: High-intensity wildfires ignite the peat itself, releasing distinct carbon stores and destroying the habitat for decades.

• Our Stance: Controlled burning protects public safety, preserves the carbon stored in the peat, and prevents the catastrophic loss of nature that comes with uncontrolled blazes. We must retain the right to use fire as a management tool.

2. Wading Birds: Habitat Alone is Not Enough

The North Pennines is one of the last strongholds for iconic wading birds like the Curlew and Lapwing. The draft plan focuses heavily on habitat restoration - wetting the ground and managing vegetation. While this is important, it ignores half the equation: predation.

You can have the most perfect habitat in the world, but if the eggs and chicks are eaten by foxes, crows, and stoats before they can fledge, the population will continue to crash.

• The Reality: Scientific evidence and practical experience show that ground-nesting birds thrive on managed moors because gamekeepers control generalist predators.

• Our Stance: A recovery plan for waders that ignores lawful predator control is doomed to fail. The Management Plan must explicitly recognize and support the role of gamekeepers in predator management to save these red-listed species.

3. Tree Planting: Right Tree, Right Place

There is a significant push in the plan for planting trees and scrub. While we support tree planting in appropriate locations (like gills and gullies), we fundamentally oppose planting on open moorland and deep peat.

Open heather moorland is a priority habitat in its own right - it is rare globally and defines the character of the North Pennines.

• The Reality: Planting trees on peat dries out the soil, releasing carbon rather than storing it. Furthermore, converting open moorland into scrub destroys the breeding grounds for the very wading birds we are trying to save, as it provides hiding places for predators.

• Our Stance: We must protect our open landscapes. "Rewilding" the moors with scrub is a step backward for biodiversity and carbon storage.

4. Heritage: It’s About People, Not Just Museums

The draft plan tends to treat "heritage" as something from the past - ruined mine workings or dry stone walls to be looked at. It fails to fully grasp that gamekeeping and driven grouse shooting are living heritage.

This is a culture and a way of life that has shaped the North Pennines for generations. It is a heritage that employs people today, fills local schools, supports local pubs, and keeps remote communities viable.

• The Reality: Without the economic driver of grouse shooting, the private investment that pays for the conservation of this landscape would disappear.

• Our Stance: The Management Plan must value and protect the cultural heritage of moorland management as a living, breathing economic driver, not just history to be viewed in a museum.

Call to Action: Respond Before 10th February

We cannot rely on others to make these points for us. The consultation team counts the responses, and the anti-grouse shooting lobby will certainly be mobilising their supporters. We need to match and exceed their volume with common sense and practical experience.

You do not need to be a policy expert to respond. You just need to care.

How to Respond

1. Go to the online consultation form.

2. You do not have to answer every single question. You can focus on the sections that matter most to you (Biodiversity, Climate Change, Heritage).

3. Use the bullet points above to guide your answers. Be polite, be professional, but be firm.

4. Submit before the deadline on February 10th.

Please, take 15 minutes today to protect the moors for the next five years. Once the plan is signed off, it will be too late to complain.