Ep. 057: Right to Roam - Who Is the Countryside Actually For? With Jon Moses

Jon Moses lives five minutes from the River Monnow. He had lived beside it for twenty years and barely knew it, because almost none of it could legally be reached. In the first lockdown he pretended for a day that he lived in Scotland, and walked up it anyway.That walk is the whole argument of this episode. Jon is co-director of the Right to Roam campaign and co-editor of Wild Service: Why Nature Needs You, and he joins Chloe and Tom to explain what the campaign is actually asking for: parity with Scotland, where a right of responsible access to land and water has been the default since 2003, rather than the roughly 8% of England that the Countryside and Rights of Way Act opened up for walking and climbing only.Tom comes at it as the concerned landowner. Someone left a bag of poo in a bush on the project. Gates have been left open with livestock behind them. There are 100 kilogram pigs on the land that have chased people and ripped trousers, and a horse who has now tried to eat one of the pigs. So the conversation gets into the practical questions rather than the slogans: what happens to liability, how conservation land gets exempted, whether someone could camp next to the cabins, and what you do about the ten per cent of people who will never apply common sense.Chloe brings the other side. Living in the Forest of Dean they could walk for three hours from the back door without crossing a road. From the Grange there is not a single usable footpath. And if the benefits to wellbeing are as large as the evidence suggests, is it fair to deny them to the many because of the few?The bit that stays with you is Jon's shift from access for recreation to access for guardianship. On the River Wye, which for access purposes already works much like Scotland, it was local people who knew the river well who raised the alarm on algal blooms long before the regulators did. You look after what you know. You cannot know what you are not allowed to see.After the interview, Chloe and Tom cover the four benefits they never got to, Rose's idea for a Right to Roam licence, and the full story of Lady the horse, two pigs, and a pair of Crocs.Chapters:[00:06] Welcome to episode 57, and a first for Tom[02:39] Project update: 20 jars of pickled cucumbers and a market garden in its second summer[04:37] Community Day, Saturday 12 September, spaces still available[06:03] Jon Moses joins: Wild Service, the Monnow Valley and a lockdown trespass[11:11] What the campaign is actually asking for: parity with Scotland[12:44] Why Scotland got there and England and Wales did not: devolution, the Lords and the Clearances[17:53] The concerned landowner: poo in a bag, open gates and 100 kilogram pigs[19:40] How Scotland handles liability, livestock and exempting conservation land[22:29] Does everyone have common sense? Why the Wilder Wander is still not marketed[26:31] Chloe: no usable footpath from our land, and the ethical question[32:17] Could someone camp next to our cabins? Privacy, curtilage and commercial use[36:47] A feudal culture: shouting rights, DofE students and the meeting point on the land[41:31] What the campaign has achieved, and access for guardianship on the River Wye[44:08] How to support Right to Roam, and why this year matters[45:13] Chloe and Tom: the four benefits we never got to[49:47] The horse and pig story[54:00] Wrapping upAbout the guestJon Moses is co-director of the Right to Roam campaign, which is calling for a Right to Roam Act for England and Wales. He is a former teacher and historian, with a PhD from London, and looks at land access through the lens of land history. He co-edited Wild Service: Why Nature Needs You (Bloomsbury, 2024) with Nick Hayes, and writes the Substack The Fields Was Our Church. He lives in the Monnow Valley on the Welsh borders, and has been working alongside Chloe and Tom through the Welsh Rewilding Alliance over the past year.Right to Roam: https://www.righttoroam.org.uk/Jon's Substack: https://jonmoses.substack.com/Facts and figures mentioned:The Countryside and Rights of Way Act 2000 created access land over mountain, moor, heath and down, covering roughly 8% of England, for walking and climbing only. No swimming, cycling or camping, with the exception of DartmoorThe Land Reform (Scotland) Act 2003 established a default right of responsible access to land and water, with exceptions for privacy, growing crops and land managementScottish Land and Estates, the main landowner body in Scotland, opposed the Act at the time and now broadly regard it as a successA Right