Cairngorms National Park Authority agrees spending priorities for new financial year
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The Cairngorms National Park Authority is set to invest more than £8m over the coming 12 months.
Spending will be targeted at projects that help local communities, nature and climate in line with the National Park Partnership Plan.
Members of the CNPA board meeting in Grantown earlier today approved the organisation’s budget and operational plan for 2024/25.
The park authority receives its main funding of around £9m – a 12 per cent rise from £8.144m for the last financial year – from Scottish Government with additional finance for the likes of peatland and nature restoration programmes.
Park bosses have said it is the ability to lever in crucially important funds from other sources that enables it to deliver and support a broader range of projects.
CNPA convener Sandy Bremner has welcomed the budget proposals.
He said: “The park authority delivers across a huge range of projects, from community action plans and access infrastructure to deer and water management.
"This funding, along with the other sources we can access, will make a real difference for the people who live and work in the national park.”
CNPA chief executive Grant Moir explained: “The operational plan covers a huge range of investment by the park authority in the national park along with our continued efforts to secure significant leverage in inward investment to the area.
"The operational spend supports jobs and investment across the national park such as peatland contractors, catchment partnerships, community organisations, business support, farmers and many others.”
Areas of work that will be delivered over the coming year include:
• Further investment in tackling the climate emergency through nature based solutions such as woodland expansion, peatland restoration and river catchment restoration projects.
• The introduction of a Climate Adaptation Fund which will be open to individual businesses, community organisations, charities, etc.
• The delivery of an Integrated Wildfire Management Plan for the Park.
• Nature friendly farming initiatives that support waders, species rich grassland, mob grazing, goose management, etc.
• Projects that support active travel including Cycle Friendly Cairngorms and incentives that will help change travel behaviours as well as continued investment in access infrastructure.
The CNPA is also looking to set up a cultural heritage network for the region and back more projects that support the health and wellbeing of the park’s residents and visitors.
Mr Moir said: “A great deal of what we deliver in the coming years will come under the banner of Cairngorms 2030, our programme of 20 long-term projects, supported by £10.7million from The National Lottery Heritage Fund.
“The programme brings together 70 organisations to deliver projects spanning nature restoration, active travel and sustainable transport, community development and health and wellbeing.
"Together, they will help the Cairngorms become the UK’s first net zero national park.”
Staffing costs for 2024/25 are expected to be around £5.6m. Excluding any potential vacancy savings, this accounts for 41 per cent of the total operational plan income of £13.701m.
In the budget for 2023/24 the like-for-like costs were 38 per cent of total operational plan income (£13.663m).
The report reveals that the contributors to the increase in staffing costs year on year include a pay award £0.333m for this financial year and an enforced increase in employer pension contributions of £770,000.
