It could have been a very different vibe on Dartmoor, when hundreds of outdoor access campaigners and outdoor enthusiasts gathered around the granite rocks of Haytor to rally, rejoice and celebrate the fact that wild camping was still legal – at least in one tiny sliver of the country.
If the right to wild camp on Dartmoor had been removed by the courts last week, then the atmosphere would have been one of anger, upset and dark despair. There would have been a healthy dose of defiance, too – and it’s likely more people would have felt the need to be there, in a display of resistance like the one back in January 2023, when thousands of protesters marched across the moor, united in grief and utter disbelief that one wealthy landowner seemed able to remove the right of hikers, bikers, bird-watchers, star gazers, families, and youth groups to do something as simple and inoffensive as spend the night out in the open.
Where Dartmoor leads, the rest of England and Wales will follow
Guy Shrubsole
But a defeat would have been a very heavy blow, seemingly shutting the door permanently on that right, and leaving the already cash-strapped Dartmoor National Park Authority (which had courageously championed the right of people to sleep out on the land it manages) facing massive court costs.
As it was, last Thursday the Supreme Court ruled very much in favour of wild campers’ continued legal right to sleep out under the stars on Dartmoor, emphatically rejecting wealthy landowner Alexander Darwall’s claim that camping was not a recreational activity, and therefore not covered by the Dartmoor Commons Act 1985.
And so, instead of a requiem for a right lost, the rally turned out to be a joyous occasion. But more than that, Haytor became a launch pad for a much more ambitious campaign calling for the extension and improvement of access rights to wild places across the rest of England and Wales, and for an outdoor code on a par with the one in Scotland, which allows responsible wild camping in most locations.
To an enormous cheer from the assembled crowd, Lewis Winks from Right to Roam and The Stars are for Everyone campaign group extended a big thanks to Darwall for raising the profile of the issue, highlighting the fact that access rights are so limited in England and Wales, and turbo-charging the campaign to do something about it. And then one speaker after another spelled out a roadmap for positive change.
“Where Dartmoor leads, the rest of England and Wales will follow,” declared access campaigner, award-winning author and co-creator of the website Who Owns England, Guy Shrubsole. “Before the announcement on Thursday, Dartmoor was the last place in the country where wild camping was legal,” he continued. “Now it’s the first place in the country where wild camping is legal.”
Campaigners like Shrubsole and Winks, both of whom admitted they were extremely nervous about the outcome of the case, are determined to harness the energy that has built up around it to push for a Right to Roam Act and a massive expansion to access rights.
Prior to the general election last year, the Labour Party joined the Liberal Democrats and Greens in lending their support to calls for better access rights, but in government (and after an intensive lobbying campaign by land owners) their enthusiasm appears to have waned.
However, several MPs from all of those parties joined pro-access campaigners outside the Supreme Court last week, and were pictured holding a Right to Roam banner. And at Haytor, Shrubsole went on to read out a long and passionate letter of support the campaign had received from Labour MP Phil Brickle, supporting exactly the freedoms Right to Roam are calling for.
Brickle, being based in Bolton, couldn’t attend, but South Devon Liberal Democrat MP Caroline Voaden was there in support, and she gave an enthusiastically received speech, agreeing with Winks that: ‘We owe a debt of thanks to Alexander Darwall, for spending half a million pounds on energising the campaign to improve access to the countryside.”
Voaden went on to point out that Darwall could have invested that money in repairing parts of the moor that have been damaged by over-grazing, or by paying the wages of some additional wardens to help stop illegal activity like fly tipping. Amid laughter, she concluded: “He could have given it to youth groups to pay outdoor instructors to teach kids how to behave in the countryside, he could have bought some boots and tents… but instead he spaffed it up a courtroom wall.”
But some of the loudest cheers went to Tom Usher, CEO of the Dartmoor Preservation Association, which has been protecting the moor since 1883, and for the duration of this case has been assisting Dartmoor National Park Authority by raising funds to help pay the spiralling court costs, had the judges’ decision gone the other way.
Now, with Darwall likely to be ordered to foot the legal bills, Usher explained that the fund, which stands at about £200,000 ($270,000) will be directed back into making Dartmoor “the most accessible wild place in the country”. Funds will be channelled into the DPA’s existing work, supporting the Youth Ranger Program and running projects including Nights Under the Stars (taking young people from all kinds of backgrounds camping on the moor) and Girls do Dartmoor, supporting young women to access outdoor areas. But Usher also announced plans for a new Dartmoor Public Access Fund, though which anyone can apply for assistance to advance an initiative that will help people’s enjoyment of the moor.
