Taking a wrong turn and straying from a public footpath. Being ‘told off’ by a landowner with clearly no understanding of human error or his responsibility to maintain the path and signage all the way across it. The beauty seen while going the wrong way, undiscoverable on the proper path. The words of Woody Guthrie’s song This land is your land come straight to mind.
England’s amazing countryside
During my latest hike, one fact was not fresh: England’s countryside is a thing of beauty. And that’s just where I’ve been hiking in Northumberland, where I’ve been able to get to on a tight budget and timescale. But don’t let that take away from the fact that Northumberland is, in my very biased opinion, the most beautiful county in our country.
Across all the British Isles. Of course, looking objectively at the fact of it, Northumberland is a county of outstanding beauty, and the story continues across the nation. We are truly blessed in England to have such idyllic natural landscapes and features on our doorstep.
And yet, all is not rosy. We might be blessed with a land on which the grass is green on both sides but with the blessing comes a curse, the curse of not being allowed to see it.
The capitalist takeover of nature
Like super highwaymen, the rich have undertaken a robbery of unimaginable and unprecedented proportions. They have taken our land away from us. The very ground beneath our feet, the very trees that give us air and the very streams which give us water.
How can this be? The tiny minority of rich landowners preventing citizens of a nation from setting foot on their nation? Holding hostage our countryside and keeping it all to themselves. I understand farmers have food for a nation to produce and a wage to earn but that doesn’t excuse this for one second.
Growing up, I learned the Countryside Code and how to protect the countryside when hiking. Not causing damage or leaving litter. Leaving things like gates as we found them. Considering other people and protecting plants and animals. All those things and more. Respecting the countryside like this and keeping it healthy and undamaged, there is no reason we should be stopped from walking on the land. It’s not as if we’re walking in people’s back gardens after all!
Taking back our countryside
As tax-paying citizens, we are locked out of our country. Locked out by giant steel gates, barbed wire fences and ever-vigilant landowners. I understand private property, but this is too much. We don’t want to walk in people’s gardens, have picnics outside their living room windows. We want to explore our nation’s land; see the beauty we are forbidden to see.
According to the Right to Roam campaign; only 8% of land in England is accessible to the public. 8%. Eight in a hundred. That rich landowners and farmers own 92% of our land and we are subsequently barred from nature is a moral crime. National Parks are a vital countenance to this but also only a drop in the ocean. We need bigger and bolder. We need a legal right to roam.
Legal right to roam
It’s not as if it’s an alien concept, nor a failed one. At least twelve countries across the world have a legal right to roam which is the public’s right to access certain public or privately owned land, lakes, and rivers for recreation and exercise. Our northern neighbour Scotland is one of those nations. We need that right in England, we need to be able to actually see the country we call home and walk upon its ground.
The very countryside of England being held hostage is a tragedy of immense proportions. The fact that we get rights to only 8% of our land and 3% of our rivers is heartbreaking. I hear the phrase ‘I want my country back’ a lot and in many contexts, most of which I don’t care for. I do want my country back, however. I want the 92% of England’s land that’s stolen away from us back. But with that, I want us all to take the responsibility to look after that land and not damage it. Because as Woody Guthrie famously said, “this land is your land, this land is my land”.
