The right to ruin
Now, I despise England as much as anyone else; its politicians, culture, history, weather* – it’s hard not to find a facet of the cramped, narrow-minded island to dislike. Statistics like “Half of England is owned by less than 1% of the population” (corporations and aristocrats, if you didn’t guess) don’t really help matters.
Guy Shrubsole, the man responsible for the above figure and author of the book Who Owns England?, argues that the state of England has not altered for centuries. He says: “A few thousand dukes, baronets and country squires own far more land than all of middle England put together.” If land was distributed equally, each person would own about an acre of land.
The campaign Right to Roam was started by author and illustrator of The Book of Trespass, Nick Hayes, as well as aforementioned environmental campaigner and author Guy Shrubsole (whose name is pretty much an aptronym).
They state that only 8% of the English countryside is open for access (and only 3% of rivers have a right of navigation), and, in an open letter to the PM, request that, “For the health of our nation, let’s give people more access to nature: let’s extend the Right to Roam.”
Of course, I mostly agree with all they say, but let me just play devil’s advocate.
Can you imagine letting the general public roam around on the 92% of private countryside? For a start, councils would have to build them car parks, cafes, toilets and shops (84% of humans start to feel nervous if they’re more than five minutes away from at least three out of the four). They’d have to create designated pathways, benches, wayfinder signs. Then the hoards would come, with their kids, bikes, dogs (which equals dog shit and plastic bags), noise and litter.
All this would disrupt nature immeasurably.
Likewise with the 97% of rivers off bounds, do we really want to open them up to pollution and litter from boats, disrupting already-fragile ecosystems?
I think all in all, nature is far better off without any humans.**
Actually, from witnessing the queues around the corner for KFC, Costa and Primark after the first lockdown, and relatively empty woodlands and countryside before, during and after lockdown (though admittedly the beaches here in Cornwall can get crowded), perhaps people like the idea of the countryside but all they really want to do is consume crap. Let’s leave them to it and leave nature alone.
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*Life has become so brittle and unpleasant. I was delighted to see some snow this weekend. But the Met Office can’t say “Enjoy some beautiful snow” – no, instead it “warns of hazardous snow and ice”. I think we know it’s slippery, let’s not forget it’s also magical.
**Like on Salisbury Plain, which I know I’m always mentioning, but I find it interesting that due to being owned by the MOD, it remains sparsely populated and inaccessible to the public, hence it’s a wildlife haven and has the largest area of calcareous grassland in northwest Europe. And a bunch of abandoned tanks.