Forestry (Hansard, 30 July 1997)

§ Mr. Chisholm

[holding answer 29 July 1997]: The subjects of the questions relate to matters undertaken by Forest Enterprise. I have asked its chief executive, Dr. Bob McIntosh, to arrange for a reply to be given.

Letter from Bob McIntosh to Mr. Hugh Bayley, dated 30 July 1997: The Secretary of State for Scotland has asked me to reply to the various Questions you raised about the Forestry Commission. I will answer each one by referring to the 5 digit reference which appears against each Question on the Order paper.

PQ No. 10711 Data on visits by educational institutions for 1996/97 is not held centrally or regionally. In accordance with the 1997–2000 Corporate Plan, para 12.20, educational visits will be a measure of Forest Enterprise performance in Promoting Public Understanding and Participation. The data will therefore be collated during 1997/98.

PQ No. 10712 Data on What's On Events for 1996/97 is not held centrally or regionally. In accordance with the 1997–2000 Corporate Plan, para 12.20, attendance at What's On Forest Events will be a measure of Forest Enterprise performance in Promoting Public Understanding and Participation. Data will therefore be collected during 1997/98.

PQ No. 10713 Forest Enterprise produces a wide variety of plans covering a range of topics at forest, regional and national levels. It would not be practicable to assemble a comprehensive list of all the organisations and individuals with whom we liaise in planning the management of Forestry Commission forests. However I can give you a list of key contacts as follows:-

Home Grown Timber Advisory Committee to the Forestry Commissioners including the sub-committees on timber supply and the environment;
Wildlife and Countryside Link forum of the national conservation and recreation NGOs;
Biodiversity Challenge Groups of NGOs (RSPB, WWF, Friends of the Earth, Butterfly Conservation and Plant Life);
Representative groups of the home grown timber processing industry;
All local planning authorities;
Countryside Agencies—SNH, EN, CCW, CC;
Heritage Agencies—HS, EH, CADW;
Enterprise Companies;
Tourist Boards.

Local community groups are involved through local Forest District Environmental Panels. Ways of upgrading local community involvement are currently being developed in line with our Action Plan to improve performance in para 12.22 of the 1997–2000 Corporate Plan.

PQ No. 10714 I set out the combined mileage for Regional offices to Forest District offices on the basis of the 31 Forest Districts planned to be in operation after amalgamation from 1.4.98.

align="center">Current 5 Region Structure
	Combined mileage	Average mileage
North Scotland (Inverness)	652	72
South Scotland (Dumfries)	363	61
Wales (Aberystwyth)	242	48
North & East England (York)	641	107
South & West England (Bristol)	423	85

303W

align="center">(b) 4 Region Structure with Bristol as the sole office for England No change in Scotland and Wales
	Combined mileage	Average mileage
England (Bristol)	1,762	160

PQ No. 10715 The number of full time equivalent jobs that will be lost in Forest Enterprise Regional offices as a result of the reduction in Regional offices, will be:

	Proposed reduction
Scotland (no reduction in offices)	Nil
Wales (no reduction in offices)	Nil
England	¹40.0
¹ The reduction of 40 posts in England will be partly as a result of closure but mostly as a result of delegation of work to Forest Districts and centralization of work to Head Office.

PQ No. 10716 The proposal to reduce the number of Regional offices from 5 to 4 will have no effect upon Forest Enterprise's ability to deliver the Standards of Service set out in the 1997–2000 Corporate Plan. Our services are delivered primarily through front-line staff in Forest Districts dealing directly with visitors, customers and suppliers. Compliance with the Forest Enterprise standards of service is assessed through the Agency performance measure "Percentage Compliance with the Citizen's Charter Standards Statement". In 1996/97 systems were introduced and staff trained in order to operate this measure from 1997/98. The measure comprises three parts:

Percentage of day visitors using forest recreation facilities who consider the service to be good or very good.
Percentage of customers using Forest Holidays cabins who consider the service to be good or very good.
Percentage of payments to suppliers paid in accordance with the relevant terms of trading.

The 1997/98 Agency target is 90% comprising:

87.5% satisfaction for forest recreation day visitors
87.5% satisfaction for Forest Holiday users.
95% payments to suppliers on time in accordance with the relevant terms of trading

PQ No. 10717 The number of timber customers for each of our Regions, as defined in paragraph 7.9 of the Forest Enterprise Corporate Plan 1997–2000, during 1996/97 was as indicated below:

	1996/97
North Scotland	36
South Scotland	44
Wales	80
North & East England	75
South & West England	99
Total GB	275

1. The UK figure is 59 less than the total for the Regions. This reflects the fact that many merchants trade in more than one Region.

2. The figures do not include individuals who purchased small amounts of firewood.

304W

PQ No. 10718 In answer to parts a. and b. of your question, I set out below the total area of land in each Forest Enterprise Region which is held on lease:

	Hectares
North Scotland	4,471.5
South Scotland	1,103.5
Wales	24,022.8
North & East England	40,770.0
South & West England	31,172.8
total Great Britain	101,540.6

We do not hold the information centrally by individual wood. In respect of part c. there are general sporting reservations in our titles over the following areas of Forestry Commission land, by Region, to a third party as follows:

	Hectares
North Scotland	nil
South Scotland	nil
Wales	48,100
North & East England	23,600
South & West England	22,100
Total GB	93,800

PQ No. 10719 We maintain links with a wide range of sports epresentative bodies at national, regional and forest district level. There are no unique contacts at regional level. The main national fora and contacts are:

Wildlife and Countryside Link forum of countryside and recreation NGOs
Countryside Recreation Network of statutory agencies
Outdoor Pursuits Committee of the CCPR (Countryside Council For Physical Recreation)
Sports Council
RAC on motor car rallying
Auto-Cycle Union on motorcycle enduro races
British Orienteering Federation
British Horse Society
Ramblers Association
Mountaineering Council for Scotland
British Cycle Federation
British Cyclecross Federation
Scottish Cyclists Union
Welsh Cyclists Union

There are also many contacts with local sports clubs at the Forest District level. I regret we do not hold central records of permits issued for specialised sports.

PQ No. 10720 The performance measure referred to in para 9.23 of the 1997–2000 Corporate Plan is one of our Agency performance measures set out on Page 52. This records annual changes to the number of visitors to sample Forestry Commission forests. For this measure, counters have been installed at visitor centres, car parks and forest drives in 86 forest locations covering a statistically representative sample of the most heavily visited areas across all Forest Districts. The objective is to measure trends in visitor numbers. 1997–98 will be the first year for measuring these trends. 305W In view of the size of the Forestry Commission estate, the number of accessible woods and public access points it is not practicable to physically count all visitors. No definitive records are therefore available for each Forest Enterprise region. The Forestry Commission does however participate in the biennial household day visits survey carried out by Social and Planning Research (S & PR) for a consortium of Departments and Agencies. The most recent survey was conducted in 1996. As part of the survey several thousand adults were interviewed at home and asked about the destinations of leisure day trips. They were also asked if a wood or forest formed part of a trip and if so who was the perceived forest owner or manager. The responses were weighted to provide estimates of visits to Forestry Commission forests and woods. On this basis the 1996 S & PR survey estimated that 42 million day visits were made to Forestry Commission forests made up as follows:

England: 33 million
Scotland: 6 million
Wales: 3 million.

There is no S & PR data for individual Forest Enterprise Regions. The 42 million figure is lower than the 50 million visits quoted for the whole Forestry Commission estate in para 9.4 of the 1997–2000 Corporate Plan since the latter also includes holiday visits not undertaken from the family home.

PQ No. 10721 Forest Enterprise has no specific list of stakeholders to be consulted on any review we may undertake over the next 3 years. The Corporate Plan sets out current policies, strategies and resouce allocations. This is circulated to over 1,000 people amongst public agencies, local authorities, NGOs, local communities and user groups. We are actively seeking comment from recipients on the broad thrust of strategies in the Corporate Plan. Focus groups will also be contacted to look at particular topics. The planned net expenditure on Forest Recreation in 1997–98, by Region, is as follows:

	£ million
North Scotland	0.8
South Scotland	0.8
Wales	0.6
North & East England	1.0
South & West England	1.8

Actual net expenditure will depend upon visitor usage, trading conditions in income generating activities and the settling down of the new register of accounts in its first year of operation.

PQ No. 10722 Forest shops and catering facilities are provided at most Forest Enterprise Visitor Centres. These are operated in two ways; either by direct district management or by concessions. The 1996–7 data and results relate solely to FE managed forest shops and catering facilities which are usually run on an integrated set of accounts for each centre with shared buildings, services and management costs. The diversity in unit net income reflects the variety of visitor numbers to different forests and the range of facilities provided by Forest Enterprise

Region	Number of forest shops/catering Complexes	Net income (£000)
North Scotland	2	22
South Scotland	5	25
Wales	1	3
North & East England	6	64
South & West England	5	53

306W

PQ No.10723 The percentage of SSSIs managed in accordance with plans endorsed by statutory conservation agencies is a Forest Enterprise Agency performance measure. A target of 100 per cent. has been set by the Forestry Commissioners as the proportion of SSSIs with endorsed plans by 31.3.98. This includes preparation, maintenance and monitoring. The 1997–98 Agency 'target allocated by Region is as follows:

	Numbers
North Scotland	80
South Scotland	54
Wales	61
North & East England	90
South & West England	90

PQ No. 10724 The percentage of Scheduled Ancient Monuments managed in accordance with plans endorsed by statutory heritage agencies is a Forest Enterprise Agency Performance measure. A target of 40 per cent., of 400 has been set by Forestry Commissioners as the number of Scheduled Ancient Monuments to have endorsed plans by 31.3.98. The aim is to ensure that all Scheduled Ancient Monuments on Forestry Commission land have endorsed plans by 31.3.2000. This 1997–98 Agency target has been allocated to Regions as follows:

	Percentage	Number
North Scotland	40	70
South Scotland	43	52
Wales	90	122
North & East England	30	58
South & West England	30	104

The varying rates in planned progress between Regions reflects the range of monuments, the variety of plan requirements and the need to pace work in harmony with heritage agency partners. I should mention that all monuments with or without beneficial management plans will continue to be safeguarded from potentially damaging operations through check systems in Forest Districts before work commences in any forest area. I hope this letter provides the answers you require. I am sorry I cannot provide full answers for questions numbers 10711, 10712 and 10719 but you will understand we are putting in place mechanisms to collate this information during 1997/98 which will be available at the time of the annual report for that year.