Natural England

Minutes of the 28th Meeting of the Countryside Agency

Present: Ewen Cameron, Chairman

Pam Warhurst

Kate Ashbrook

Janet Bradbury 

Martin Doughty

Peter Fane

Luna Frank-Riley

Tony Hams 

Graham James

Philip Lowe

Sue Stapely

In attendance: Richard Wakeford, Chief Executive

Margaret Clark, Director

David Coleman, Director

John Tomlinson, Director

Sarah Sleet, Director

Fiona Hope, Assistant to the Chief Executive

CHAIRMAN'S INTRODUCTION

The Chairman welcomed new members of Agency staff observing the meeting, Judith Welham and Michelle Goodson.

APOLOGIES FOR ABSENCE

Apologies had been received from John Varley, Victoria Edwards and Frances Rowe.

MINUTES OF MEETING HELD 17 APRIL 2002.

The minutes were approved and signed by the Chairman.

MATTERS ARISING

The Board noted the Matters Arising report comprising an update on Board paper AP02/11, South Downs National Park: Proposals for Local Authority Consultation. 

The Chairman told the Board that he had met with the Minister of State for Rural Affairs on 9 May, to discuss the fact that the Agency had not received its Grant in Aid award for the current financial year. The Minister had promised the Chairman at the meeting that the Agency would receive its Grant in Aid award before today's Board meeting; but no letter had arrived. The Chairman warned the Board of the Minister's guidance that when the Grant in Aid was awarded it might be £2 million less than expected, or £2 million might be clawed back in-year. The Chair asked the Chief Executive to provide the Board with some more detail on the issue.

Richard Wakeford explained that he did not know whether the Agency would receive £2 million less than the Agency's baseline budget, or whether the £2 million reduction would be deducted from the baseline plus the additional resources requested for CRoW Act implementation. The coming year would be further complicated by the introduction of Resource Accounting, which would strictly attribute costs to the period in which they were incurred, removing the flexibility to transfer payments between the end and start of financial years, possible under the previous cash accounting regime. The Chief Executive undertook to keep the Board appraised of the implications of introducing Resource Accounting over the year. 

Richard Wakeford said that the meeting with the Rural Affairs Minister had provided welcome news about the Agency's bids in the Spending Review 2002 process. Officials had previously warned the Agency officers that when the Agency's Rural White Paper commitments came to an end, the associated resources would be withdrawn. The Rural Affairs Minister had, however, assured the Chairman and Deputy Chair that this was not his intention, but rather the Agency would be able to recycle these resources for other Agency work to benefit the countryside. The Minister had also said that he had welcomed the Board's bids for the current Spending Review, but had had to prioritise the bids down to two: access implementation and Vital Villages/Communities work. Regrettably, in the current climate of fierce pressure for resources, DEFRA had not been able to put forward the other bids to the Treasury. But it still would be possible to return to the demands of the rural affairs agenda after the settlement, since DEFRA recognised the need to address rural affairs properly for the first time under any government.

Richard Wakeford outlined for the Board the Agency's next steps for preparing the 03/04 Corporate Plan. The Executive had two days scheduled to discuss options for a way ahead in May and June, and the Board would spend the afternoon of its Away Day on 3 July, considering some of options proposed. The Board would have the opportunity to consider the future Corporate Plan in more detail at the July and September Board meetings. At the meeting, the Rural Affairs Minister had committed to approve the Agency's Corporate Plan and issue a provisional Grant in Aid award in November each year. That was a welcome commitment.

Taking forward the Report of the Policy Commission on the Future of Farming and Food (AP02/13)

(In attendance, Richard Lloyd)

Introducing the paper, Richard Lloyd explained that the Government intended to publish a full response to the Policy Commission's report and to publish a new strategy for food and farming in the early autumn. The response and strategy would be informed by the outcome of the Spending Review 2002 process and by a major consultation exercise with stakeholders, currently under way. The Agency should make a meaningful input into the consultation process, but the subject coverage was very wide. Therefore, the Agency should be selective and only engage on issues of particular interest and expertise, and in taking forward a national pilot scheme to provide school children with a better understanding of food and farming (at the request of the Prime Minister).

In discussion, Board members made the following points;

a. The issue was very complex and it was important not to lose sight of the strategic issues in the detail;

b. The Government's response to the Policy Commission would involve significant public expenditure, and could generate additional funds for wider rural development besides addressing problems with the food chain. Many of the target groups for existing funding for agricultural diversification were not aware of the funds or how to access them, and the Agency should facilitate the access of these resources, drawing upon its experience with Land Management Initiatives. Equally, awareness among the agriculture industry was sketchy, and promoting these would be very important;

c. The Policy Commission had urged a step change to food and farming, yet the paper's proposed way ahead was too much 'business as usual'. Similarly, the paper had been an opportunity for the Agency to show its expertise and breadth of work in and for the countryside, but regrettably remained narrowly focussed. The Agency needed a bold and clear set of principles for what it wanted for landscape, biodiversity and access. The Agency should champion the radical future that the Policy Commission promised;

d. The Agency needed to ensure that it did not duplicate work undertaken by other organisations. In particular, the regional development agencies were also thinking about how to add value to locally produced food and other products. The message that quality local food could make a significant health contribution was getting lost, however; 

e. Modulation would bring considerable additional funding into the agriculture arena (the Treasury matched funds) and the Agency should be ready to recommend the public goods that these resources should deliver;

f. The proposed pilot scheme to give school children access to farms would not only educate them about where food comes from, but also give them confidence to access the countryside throughout life. It would be very challenging to implement and needed to be targeted according to the evidence of need In particular, teachers were unlikely to take pupils out for a general learning day, so any visits must be designed to relate to the National Curriculum. The Agency must learn from others already engaged in work connecting children with school children. For example, there would be a 'Business of Farming' conference held in Norfolk in June, aimed at business studies sixth formers;

j. The pilot must go beyond petting lambs, and focus on food, shopping and cooking. The visits should also focus on the whole food chain, rather than simply farms. Most food chain activity does not take place on farms. Children should visit abattoirs or food processing plants, as well as farms

k. The Agency should not allow core strategic objectives to suffer because resources and attention were diverted into the pilot for connecting school children with food and farming. The pilot would have immense reputational and financial consequences for the Agency if it was not successful. A higher priority for the Agency was to extract all the lessons from the Land Management Initiatives. The Agency should ensure that it delivered its core business before taking on new work, whether endorsed by the Prime Minister or not;

k. There would be varying interest from schools in the pilot, and this would not necessarily be contingent on the different schools' resources.

Summing up the discussion, the Chairman concluded:

• the Board had agreed the recommendations for taking forward the work of the Policy Commission of Food and Farming, that is to concentrate the Agency's effort on the development of farm assurance schemes, the development of added value and niche products, CAP reform, the review of agri-environment schemes, encouraging diversification, ensuring benefits to rural communities from the ERDP, integrating ERDP with other programmes, promoting whole farm plans and IT solutions;
• the Agency needed to think in a fresher way about the links between public health and healthy eating;
• the Agency needed to establish exactly how it could add value in running a pilot scheme to link school children with food and farming.  

DEFRA Review of agri-environment schemes (AP02/14)

(In attendance, Sue Cornwell)

Introducing the paper, Sue Cornwell explained that DEFRA was carrying out a wide ranging review of agri-environment schemes, with the intention that the results would feed into the mid term evaluation of the ERDP in 2003. The review included a public consultation seeking views at a strategic level. The paper set out a proposed approach for the Agency and broad principles for its advice to DEFRA on the future shape of agri-environment schemes. 

In discussion, Board members made the following points:

a. DEFRA's review of agri-environment schemes had been set up some time before the Policy Commission on Food and Farming. The Agency was in a strong position to put forward advice to DEFRA based on its practical experience through demonstration projects;

b. The proposed broad and shallow agri-environment scheme could spread modulation funds too thinly. Modulation should, however, offer the opportunity for participation in agri-environment schemes to the majority of landowners, rather than the handful at present;

c. Securing access and environmental management were surprisingly compatible objectives, but access would not be included in the future agri-environment scheme if the Agency did not champion it;

d. Hitherto, there had been too great an emphasis on income foregone when designing agri-environment schemes. English Nature had shown this to be an unhelpful approach for environmental benefits. The Agency should champion 

a more positive approach, where land managers had a contract with society to provide public goods, and were paid to do so;

e. The Agency should define what it sought to achieve out of the review of agri-environment schemes, reminding the Government of its vision in a strategy for sustainable land management;

f. Agri-environment schemes could be used to turn around the farming system. There should be a gap between minimum acceptable standards of land management and where the proposed broad and shallow agri-environment scheme applied. Extra payment should be contingent on extra work, so that responsible farmers were rewarded fairly and not all farmers were eligible. The broad and shallow scheme should not be a production subsidy by another name. Existing agri-environment schemes tended to be too prescriptive, so funding was not contingent on measurable outcomes;

g. The application process for the future agri-environment scheme should be as simple as possible. For example, there should be a waiting list, so that land managers did not have to reapply if their application had been unsuccessful;

h. The Agency needed to think about how the proposed broad and shallow scheme should link to other agri-environment schemes, such as green hill farming. Similarly, the Agency should think about the implications if the scheme could only target half of the country;

i. The Agency should consider how the future agri-environment scheme could be used to achieve wider environmental goods, such as flood defence;

j. Qualification for agri-environment subsidy should be contingent on rights of way on the land being in good order. 

Summing up the discussion, the Chairman concluded that the Agency's advice to DEFRA on the future shape of agri-environment schemes should:

• not be based on the principle of income foregone;
• ensure that maintenance of rights of way in good order was a prerequisite for qualifying for subsidy;
• oblige higher standards for what constituted good agricultural practice, than currently proposed.  

Local Heritage Initiative: proposed urban extension (AP02/15)

Introducing the paper, Nicola Webley explained that the Agency had been running the Local Heritage Initiative in partnership with the Heritage Lottery Fund for just over 2 years. Local Heritage Initiative projects included the built environment, customs and traditions, and wildlife heritage. The Heritage Lottery Fund was pleased with the Agency's management of the scheme and quality of the projects, and had invited the Agency to manage the extension of the scheme into urban areas, in partnership with Groundwork UK. The Local Heritage Initiative team, however, had concerns around the potential role for Groundwork UK. Groundwork Trusts had expertise in regeneration of rundown urban areas through environmental action, but the team questioned whether Groundwork UK (the umbrella body) had the breadth of experience to deliver the Local Heritage Initiative. 

The Heritage Lottery Fund considered that the Local Heritage Initiative offered positive outcomes in terms of building community capacity. An urban extension could offer opportunities to grow the Agency's experience of working with disadvantaged groups. The extension of the scheme to urban areas could also offer the opportunity of increasing understanding between town and country.

However, the Agency should be careful that the Heritage Lottery Fund did not demand too much of the scheme.

In discussion, Board members made the following points: 

a. The Agency should proceed with the proposed extension of the Initiative, provided that it was fully aware of the risks of so doing. In particular, it would be important not to increase any costs to the Agency without clear benefits to the countryside, otherwise its involvement might be challenged. If the Agency did not proceed, the Heritage Lottery Fund would proceed itself. It was essential not to allow a 'rural-urban battleground' to emerge;

b. The Local Heritage Initiative had been very successful, and the Agency should give strong consideration to the extension of successful work. Over 100 people were involved in each application for grants, which had brought many rural communities into contact with the Agency and its work. An extension of the initiative to urban areas would therefore bring many urban communities into contact with the Agency also;

c. The urban extension would not be cost neutral to the Agency, as it would have to provide 25 percent of the administration costs. These need to be covered by an urban partner. The Board should be wary of imposing burdens on the Agency organisation that was already stretched in terms of administration resources and capacity. The Agency must ensure that it provides the necessary resources in the regions if it proceeds with the extension;

d. The proposed partnership with Groundwork suggested considerable risk for the Agency. Local Groundwork trusts had very varied delivery capacity, acted as independent organisations, and suffered from significant staffing fluctuations. Groundwork UK had considerable experience in urban regeneration through its environmental work, but was inexperienced in the built environment, the subject of the Local Heritage Initiative. The urban extension should therefore be designed by organisations that were already experienced in urban built heritage, such as the Church Urban Fund;

e. The Agency should ensure that it agreed shared outcomes for the work with the Heritage Lottery Fund and Groundwork, to ensure that the urban extension benefitted the most needy communities; 

f. The Heritage Lottery Fund's aspirations for the urban extension of the Local Heritage Initiative as a means to address social exclusion were perhaps over ambitious. Communities tended to come to value their heritage after they had been integrated into a community, rather than as a means for integration;

g. The Agency was recognised as an important player in the urban:rural debate by the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, and the Department for Transport, Local Government and the Regions. The urban extension of the Initiative would be a useful opportunity to extend the Agency's influence of the debate, and help break down rural: urban barriers, and build interrelationships between town and country; 

h. There were a great variety of funding streams for neighbourhood renewal and community capacity building. The Agency should endeavour to tap into these resources for this work, but not at the expense of achieving outcomes on the ground;

i. The Agency had considerable experience of working with urban communities, through its Doorstep Greens, Millennium Greens and Walking the Way to Health work. The Agency should ensure that it drew on that experience to inform the urban extension of the Local Heritage Initiative, and because the same lessons did not have to be learned again. 

Summing up the discussion, the Chairman concluded that the Board had accepted the recommendation to extend of the Local Heritage Initiative into urban areas provided that:

• it was an extension of the existing scheme;
• it was a largely cost neutral activity (Margaret Clark was to be allowed some flexibility in negotiating the exact financial commitment);
• the Agency's partners in the scheme should share administration costs; 
• the Agency would push for greater flexibility from the Heritage Lottery Fund over partners for the extension of the scheme;
• the Agency must communicate its learning about the interaction of town and country, both within the Agency and to outside audiences.  

Review of Local Government Finance (AP02/16)

(In attendance, Crispin Moor and Mark Behrendt)

Introducing the paper, Crispin Moor and Mark Behrendt explained that the proposed objective for the Agency was for the review of local government finance to recognise the additional costs to local authorities caused by rurality. The Agency should press for the following outcomes from the Review:

• Agreement from Government in favour of a presumption that rurality impacted on the costs of service delivery in all six spending blocks within the SSA system;
• The application of sparsity indicators in a more consistent way across the six spending blocks;
• The inclusion of a fixed costs grant of "being in business" to all local authorities. This could potentially benefit small local authorities, which correlated strongly with the rural authorities;
• Agreement from Government to work with the Agency and other partners to research and explore the use of dispersion and settlement data as potentially a more accurate approach than the sparsity indicator currently used, for assessing the impacts of rurality on rural service delivery costs. The recent experience of resource allocation systems in place in Scotland and Wales might provide useful evidence.  

• In the medium term, and dependent on the results of its research on dispersion and settlement patterns, the Agency should promote the use of such data in future refinement and reforms to the resource allocation systems to local government. There were reasonable chances of making progress on these short term objectives. However, interest groups representing London and metropolitan local authority interests would also be making strong cases for changes to the SSA system to meet their particular spending needs. The Agency should continue to assert that the effectiveness and efficiency of local government was as significant as spending totals and the Agency should continue rural proof performance systems including Best Value, Local PSAs, and Comprehensive Performance Assessments.  

The Agency should work with relevant local authority groups (including the County Councils Network, the most Sparsely Populated Council group, and the Shire Districts Liaison Group). The Agency should also brief and seek to influence DEFRA and DTLR as well as parliamentarians. 

• The DTLR would be publishing a range of options for change in the late summer, Ministers would announce their decisions on these options in November. The reformed distribution system would be introduced for the financial year 2003/4. 

In discussion, Board members made the following points:

a. The Agency should be keenly aware that other interest groups, besides those speaking for rural populations, would put forward strong arguments to support why they were special cases for additional funding;

b. Increasing the level of resources available at local authority level would be one of the best ways to improve the quality of services, and therefore life, for rural people. However, improving this quality of service would not solely be a matter of increased resources but also an improvement in the way in which those services were delivered;

c. It would be important to explain, in making the case for additional resource allocation to rural local authorities, how much more costly it was for rural local authorities to be in business than for urban local authorities. Urban local authorities had only one layer, whereas, rural local authorities had two layers - or even three in National Parks; 

d. There were other divides within England that demanded greater area cost adjustment, than the rural-urban divide. The greatest differences were between London and other, provincial, cities, and between the South East and the rest of England. 

e. Service provision in very deep rural areas was at proportionately greater cost due to the diseconomies of scale of service provision infrastructure, such as schools;

f. England, Scotland and Wales had been addressing rural service provision differently since the Scottish Parliament and Welsh Assembly were established. Scotland and Wales appeared to be looking at the rural dimension more systematically. The Agency should encourage more cross-border learning and collaboration.

Summing up the discussion the Chairman concluded that the Board had:

• agreed the recommendation that the Agency's work should focus on seeking to achieve changes in the way rural costs are treated in the current review of local government finance allocation formula, and exploring longer term possibilities for assessing rurality;
• agreed the recommendation that the Agency's messages to the local government finance review should be that there needs to be a more consistent approach across spending blocks, and a presumption that rurality is a cost driver in all services; that there is a basic minimum cost of being in business for local authorities, and therefore there should be a revised approach to Area Cost Adjustment;
• agreed that the Agency should be seeking to encourage rural authorities to raise more funding through their local taxpayers and for parish councils to use their precepting powers.  

Corporate Plan End of Year Report for 2001/2002 (AP02/17)

(In attendance, Sarah Sleet)

Introducing the paper, Sarah Sleet explained that Agency's achievements of the past year had been against the background of considerable change within the Agency, that is, the Foot and Mouth Disease outbreak, the creation of a new Government department, DEFRA, as well as reorganisation inside the Agency. The Agency's achievement of ninety percent of its outputs was commendable, therefore. 

In discussion, Board members made the following points:

a. The Foot and Mouth Disease outbreak had been a considerable disruption to the Agency's planned work, in the year in which the Agency had sought to do much more delivery. The achievements of the year were impressive, therefore;

b. It had been important that the Agency had been able to carry payments over from the financial year 2001/02 to 2002/03. This would not be possible at the end of the current year due to the adoption of Resource Accounting. The Board would need reassurance from the Chief Executive that the Agency would be able to manage its budget without the end-year flexibility possible under cash accounting;

c. Board members would welcome more in-year monitoring and evaluation of Agency programmes, and looked forward to learning how this work was progressing. In particular, the Agency needed to find ways in which to evaluate the effectiveness of its influencing work;

d. Administrative support for all programmes seemed to be very limited, including Planning and Sustainable Development work, the negative impact of which was disproportional to the cost saving;

e. Research, Data and Information did not have a report in the Board paper and so it was hard to see how its work was progressing;

f. The Agency needed to clarify its role in the Rural Affairs Forum for England;

g. It was impressive that the Agency had achieved so much notwithstanding numerous vacant posts throughout the year. However, vacancies had had a negative impact. The Parliamentary team had had only half its staff complement, which had damaged the Agency's ability to lobby for the countryside and have a high profile among parliamentarians. The Board needed to assess the profile of the Agency and the impact of its lobbying work;

h. The Agency should distinguish between spending money and achieving outcomes. The Vital Villages programme had struggled to spend its resources at first, but if village communities did not yet have the capacity to make good use of a Vital Villages grant, the Agency should not see the underspend of that programme as a failure. Research would soon be available to determine the reasons underpinning the lack of uptake of Vital Villages grants, and the Agency should learn from that. In future, the Agency should be much clearer about what it wants to achieve, and work to changing the culture of considering that resources spent equals public good achieved;

i. There were potentially great synergies between the Agency's IT work, the communications work on the Agency's web presence, and the Local Heritage Initiative Information, Communication and Technology work. The Agency must ensure that linkages were made and that learning and efficiencies between the work were captured.

Summing up the discussion, the Chair said that the Board had approved the End of Year report for 2001/02.

Knowledge Management in the Countryside Agency (AP02/18)

(In attendance, Liz Thompson and Barney Smith)

Introducing the paper, Liz Thompson explained that the Agency's implementation of Knowledge Management was very highly regarded within the public sector, extending the reputation and reach of the Agency. The Learning Networks infrastructure was now in place, which Board members would be shown after the meeting, but significant cultural change would be needed to ensure effective Knowledge Management. Changing behaviour so that the organisation shared knowledge effectively would take time, as in all organisations. 

In discussion, Board members made the following points;

a. It was important to reinforce the philosophy behind knowledge management, that is, sharing what we know and knowing where to find what we don't know;

b. Three groups needed to share knowledge using the Agency's knowledge management infrastructure: officers, Board members and external partners;

c. It was important for the organisation to provide the means for staff to respond professionally to enquiry from outside. Equally it was essential for staff to be able to share knowledge within the Agency so that the organisation learned lessons only once, and did not duplicate work;

d. There was a role for Board members in leading the cultural change necessary to ensure effective knowledge management; communication was 20 percent technology, 80 percent behavioural;

e. Incentives should be put in place to encourage staff to participate in learning networks. Participation in learning networks should be part of performance appraisal, and non-participation should be addressed as any other form of under-performance;

f. The Agency should remember that information does not equal knowledge, and knowledge does not equal wisdom. The Agency needed to build in more time and resources to absorb its information into knowledge, and to reflect on its knowledge to acquire wisdom. There must be capacity for discussion within the organisation: staff seem currently to be too busy to think properly about the countryside. The Agency is in danger of spending lots of money while becoming less wise.

Summing up the discussion, the Chairman concluded that the Board;

• endorsed the work that the Agency was undertaking to manage its know-how and expertise better, and to share knowledge more effectively with key partners;
• approved the level of time and resources identified for evaluating Learning Networks.  

DATE AND LOCATION OF NEXT MEETING

The next meeting of the Countryside Agency Board would be on 18 July 2002 in John Dower House.