Campaigners are celebrating today’s decision to overturn the controversial ruling earlier this year that made camping illegal on Dartmoor without landowner permission.
Lewis Winks, a campaigner with The Stars Are For Everyone, said:
“A permission is not the same as a right – and today the court has seen sense and re-established people’s right to camp without needing permission in Dartmoor National Park. Fundamentally this means that access to a night under the stars on one of the UKs most iconic landscapes now does not rely on the whims of individual landowners but is owned by ordinary people. We hope this will now serve as a blueprint for other places to follow suit.
“Nature-connectedness in the UK is the lowest across the whole of Europe. We must extend guaranteed rights of access across the UK. Of course, this has to be done responsibly, no one seeks to destroy the very thing we so need connection to, but we cannot even begin to properly have those discussions until the rights now offered on Dartmoor are extended more widely.
“For this reason, and encouraged by today’s ruling, we will continue to push for a new Right to Roam Act for England that defends and extends the public’s right to access nature ”
“We thank all those that have supported the campaign to date, and thank the officers and members of Dartmoor National Park Authority for pursuing this case.”
Link to full judgement here.
