An Update on BOATS - Even Better News!

Rosemary Horsey

The Natural Environment and Rural Communities (NERC) Act of 2006 brought to an end the practice of creating new Byways Open to All Traffic (BOATs), which allow mechanised vehicles legal access to green lanes, on the basis of historic use by horse and cart. The Act laid down a cut-off date of 20 January 2005 for claims for new BOATs, thereby invalidating many hundreds of the applications which had been hurriedly submitted in anticipation of the new legislation. The Green Lanes Protection Group (GLPG), a coalition of organisations, including CPRE, had been formed to see the Bill through the legislative process and to ensure that ministers, MPs and peers understood the implications for the countryside. The success of the Bill in limiting the number of green lanes which could be used legally by mechanised vehicles was due entirely to the hard work of a few dedicated and knowledgeable individuals representing the GLPG.

Test Case to Clear Confusion over Last Minute Claims

However after the NERC Act came into force, some confusion arose as to how strictly an exempt claim, lodged before the cut-off date, had to comply with the statutory requirements in order to be valid. The GLPG obtained an opinion from George Laurence, a QC with expertise in rights-of-way matters, who advised that strict adherence was necessary for a claim to be exempt from the NERC Act. Unfortunately Defra considered a more relaxed approach to the documentation which accompanied the application was adequate, so it was clear that a test case would be necessary to provide clarification.

Last year two landowners, Winchester College and Humphreys Feeds, with support from the GLPG and their local community, took Hampshire County Council to court over a proposed BOAT at Twyford. Although the High Court judge ruled in favour of the county council, Winchester College persevered and this ruling was later overturned in the Court of Appeal. Consequently all eighteen of the claims for new BOATs in our county which were previously exempt from the NERC Act legislation have now been rejected as invalid.

CPRE Celebrates a Significant Victory

The eighteen Hampshire parishes concerned have thus been spared the considerable worry and expense of trying to protect their local rights of way from 4x4s and motorbikes, but over the country as a whole the Court of Appeal ruling has probably negated some 600 to 700 claims for new BOATs. In Somerset alone over 100 claims have been rejected.

To the amazing success of the NERC Act in protecting the tranquillity of the English countryside has been added the Court of Appeal ruling.

Good news indeed.

August 2008