National park budget cuts mean that the BMC could be joining forces with the National Trust and the RSPB to take over Stanage. Ed Douglas reports.

In November, the Peak District National Park Authority announced it was leasing the Roaches to Staffordshire Wildlife Trust for 125 years. The decision was part of the PDNPA’s rolling programme of transferring properties to “like-minded bodies” in the face of deep budget cuts. Now attention is turning to another iconic crag owned by the PDNPA, this time in Derbyshire:  Stanage.

The fate of a crag that draws climbers and walkers from all over Britain and abroad requires the BMC to pay close attention. Although Stanage is protected under UK and European designations, and access to it is secured under the CRoW Act, the BMC is already preparing to respond when the PDNPA announces its intentions for the North Lees Estate, which includes Stanage.

So far, the PDNPA has given no indication of how it will proceed. The authority’s plan for disposing of its estates is currently under review and won’t be known for a few more weeks. But there are essentially three options: it can simply retain ownership and continue to manage the site, offer a lease to take over the management or sell the property outright. Deep cuts in the PDNPA’s budget makes some kind of divestment more likely than not.

If the PDNPA does offer to lease or sell Stanage, then the BMC hopes that the PDNPA’s aspirations for a deal are more clearly stated than they were with the Roaches. The Staffordshire Wildlife Trust’s bid was substantially larger than that from the National Trust – the BMC’s preferred bidder. How much SWT paid is still not publicly known, even though it included financial support from Staffordshire Moorlands District Council.

In recent weeks, the BMC has been approached by the National Trust to join forces with them and the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds in submitting a strong bid to take over Stanage if and when the PDNPA puts the estate out to tender. The BMC is already co-operating successfully with both organisations in the management of the Peak’s Eastern Edges, and what’s proposed is very exciting – securing the long-term future of Stanage in the best interests of conservation and recreation. 

It would also be a bigger commitment than the approach taken for the Eastern Edges, not least financially. The NT’s proposal would require the BMC to share the management costs of the estate. That is something the BMC is actively considering. The issue has been discussed by the BMC’s Executive and National Council, and at the Peak District Area Committee. So far there has been strong support to explore the option further. Working successfully at Stanage with such influential bodies could have positive benefits elsewhere in the UK.

There have been a few concerns as well, most notably that the BMC should not involve itself in purchasing an estate that already belongs to the nation. North Lees was bought in 1975 – with taxpayers’ money. The price was just £35,000, the sum spent by its previous owner, General Sir Hugh Beach, in restoring North Lees Hall. Beach, who is now 88, essentially gifted Stanage to the nation to secure its future as a jewel in the Peak District’s crown.

Should the BMC decide after consulting its members to join the National Trust’s bid, it is likely there will be some kind of national appeal to contribute to an endowment fund for the management of the estate.

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