Would you pay to visit the national park?

People may have to pay to access Dartmoor in the future unless the government comes up with a new way of funding national parks.

That’s one of the options suggested by Dartmoor National Park Authority’s (DNPA) Chief Executive, as the park faces a potential nine per cent cut in funding for the next financial year.

If this is the case, the authority will have to reduce costs to balance its budget over the next few years, leading to redundancies and the loss of facilities.

The Princetown Visitor Centre is already due to close later this year because of financial pressures.

Since 2010, the national park grant has been cut by 50 per cent in real terms. Had it kept pace with inflation, it would now be worth £7.2 million, members of DNPA were told at a budget meeting.

The authority anticipates receiving a grant for day-to-day spending of £3.8 million for 2025/26, or £3.5 million if the expected nine per cent cut is implemented.

Members agreed to use up to £615,000 from its reserves to balance the budget, but called the situation “depressing and scary” and said continuing to use funds in this way is not sustainable.

The authority is asking the government if it can spend any extra one-off capital grants on costs like staffing, its largest expenditure, which accounts for more than 90 per cent of its funding.

Capital can usually only be spent on long-term investments and not on day-to-day running of the park.

National park member James McInnes said: “The government cannot keep doing this, slicing money out of an organisation and expecting the national park to exist in its current form.”

Chief Executive Dr. Kevin Bishop said a national debate is needed.

“Our national parks are this country’s biggest free-to-enjoy asset,” he said. “More people go to national parks than to Premier League football games. If they are not to be funded by the public purse, the government needs to lead on this.”

“Do we charge entry or have hiking licences, like some countries do, which people need every time they go for a walk? The funding cannot keep getting cut unless the preferred option is to not have a national park of any merit.”

DNPA members said the country’s national parks were even more important after the lockdown, when they “were swamped.”

Peter Harper said it is an “incredibly depressing situation at the moment,” but he knew there was a huge amount of work going on to mitigate things.

He said it is important to have “shovel-ready” projects if the Department for Environment, Food & Rural Affairs (Defra) finds some unexpected money “down the back of the sofa.”

Philip Sanders had a feeling the government is moving towards national parks being more self-financing, so the authority should be thinking about buying something that could bring in income.

Members were asked to come forward with ideas for income generation.

The meeting learned that all national parks are in a similar position, with the Peak District National Park making at least 20 redundancies and a visitor centre at Lake Windermere in the Lake District National Park being sold.

Dr. Bishop said that to influence the government, they needed to build a relationship with it, and upcoming visits to Dartmoor by ministers were a chance to do that.

He continued: “Whilst austerity might be coming back, it never really left. We have got ambition and a powerful vision, and our national parks are good for all parts of society. We need to be proud of what we do, and we need to keep doing it.”

Members approved the budget for 2025/26.