Our forests may be sold off

[eeyore]

Originally Posted by loripo

Not even our homeland will belong us if this goes ahead. Mad, mad, mad!

Our "homeland" doesnt belong to us now - somewhere in the region of 80% of the land in britain is in private hands anyway

[brendaward]

If the forests need selling off because they are not making money, they just need better management to generate more revenue. It is short sighted to sell it off to private foresters or developers or whoever. If someone wants to buy the forests, it is to make money from viable business. Lets get it going as a good viable business in our hands to generate money to slowly pay the debts. Trees are a renewable resource, but when the land has gone we would never be able to get it back. For the want of a horse, a kingdom was lost.

[loripo]

Originally Posted by brendaward

I thought that most of the pine plantations were owned by the private land owners. Does that mean that the ones that we currently own as a nation and can walk or drive through might have Tolls or pay booths like parts of Dolby forest?

If anything else is sold off we will have nothing left to sell, then what will they do in the next crisis. I am mortified that this is even being considered.

The articles I've read talk about laws dating back to the Magna Carta being 'rewritten' so I assumed (wrongly I hope) that this would be ancient forest land being sold off, not plantations.

[stigofthedump]

Originally Posted by eeyore

Our "homeland" doesnt belong to us now - somewhere in the region of 80% of the land in britain is in private hands anyway

Indeed Eeyore, but as concerned folk we should at least try and hold the powers that be to account, do you not think so?

Vince

[shenk1]

Money

The rich selling to the rich to make the rich richer

[eeyore]

Originally Posted by shenk1

Money

The rich selling to the rich to make the rich richer

um - the country is several hundred billion pounds in debt - how that qualifies as rich is difficult to acertain

[eeyore]

Originally Posted by brendaward

If the forests need selling off because they are not making money, they just need better management to generate more revenue. It is short sighted to sell it off to private foresters or developers or whoever. If someone wants to buy the forests, it is to make money from viable business. Lets get it going as a good viable business in our hands to generate money to slowly pay the debts. Trees are a renewable resource, but when the land has gone we would never be able to get it back. For the want of a horse, a kingdom was lost.

Three points -

a) we need the money now - not slowly over 25 years (the interest on what we owe will cost a shed load more than the trickle of income softwood forestry will give us)

b) because we need the money now if it doesnt come from this it will come from somewhere else - most likely the conservation budgets (already slashed by 30% )

c) as i said above many plantations are virtually worthless and are a depreciating asset - that is the older the trees get the less they are worth as a standing crop, no ammount of "better management" will make them worth more than the cost of harvesting. True we could fell them and start over with a more sustainable crop, but the country doesnt have the money to invest in doing that.

[shenk1]

The country may not be rich but the individuals making the decisions are

(A few billions worth of bank shares waiting for prices to rise aint to be sniffed at either)

[eeyore]

Originally Posted by loripo

The articles I've read talk about laws dating back to the Magna Carta being 'rewritten' so I assumed (wrongly I hope) that this would be ancient forest land being sold off, not plantations.

journalistic licence - the forest laws that "date back to the magna carta" have already largely been rewritten or overuled by more modern legislation anyway - they also dont apply to 99% of forestry commision land in the first place.

also the "forest laws" have nowt to do with woodland - the "forest" at the time refered to the "hunting forests" - a forest being a hunting preserve for the nobility , not necessarily wooded , which is why much of the new forest is heathland. The forest laws gave commoners rights in the hunting forest and governed what they could and couldnt do re grazing, firewood, hunting and foraging for food etc

[eeyore]

Originally Posted by stigofthedump

Indeed Eeyore, but as concerned folk we should at least try and hold the powers that be to account, do you not think so?

Vince

I agree vince, but we need to hold them to account realistically - ie we need to protect the special places, we need to ensure that if SSSIs are sold their protection is maintained, and we need to ensure that the money generated is actually spent on paying off the debt, not on politicians salaries and expenses.

However stamping our foot and refusing to countenance any sale or cut because we dont like them isnt the way to go because the debt is real, as is the need to spend less than we "earn"

Anyone can be against something - like a child refusing to eat an untasted vegetable - but if we want anyone to take our objection seriously we need to propose a realistic alternative of how the same ammount of money could be saved or generated without making the cut/sale we dont like.