Strawberry Lea Plantation
The Reserve Advisory Group consisted of representatives of various known groups including English Nature, Peak District National Park, Sheffield City Council (Ecology Officer) plus local Ramblers and the CPRE and a number of local people who were either selected or got to know about the existence of the RAG and decided to come along.
These meetings began in 2001.
The decision to declare Blacka Moor a Nature Reserve, alongside the other Sheffield sites, was already taken at council level. So those attending the meetings were presented with that as a fait accompli. This was a matter for some comment and contention even early on because of a strong perception among a small number of those attending that this might not be consistent with the original designation embedded in the Graves Covenant. This could have been cleared up at the outset if the council officers in legal and administration had produced the document and the RAG meetings and individuals enquiring had been able to examine it. But for some reason those who were awkward enough to make enquiries were fobbed off, and when it was raised at RAG meetings there was an airy suggestion of impenetrable legalese and some mention of paths being maintained. Even when councillors were discussing the matter in committee they were presented with a
paper telling them that it was not good practice to disclose such things!
What is crucial in this is that the lack of knowledge at that time of the specific information in the Graves Covenenant emasculated the opposition to setting up a management plan based predominantly on conservationist priorities. While the significance of managing according to recreational principles rather than conservation principles was raised, SWT's director felt able to declare that they were one and the same! Hence the predominant conservation element in the discussions and in the subsequent management plan. It must also be said that those council members who accepted the arguments in the paper on release of deeds were acting contrary to basic democratic principles and procedures. The transcript which they must have seen states unambiguously that the land is for recreation and it should have been clear that this could not be compatible with any commonly accepted definition of a nature reserve. The gist of the argument used amounted to a 'new' definition of nature reserve which did not really mean it was 'reserved'. This should be put alongside the other argument later proposed that the landscape was not 'natural' but artificial with the implication that its artificiality should be encouraged against any tendency of 'nature' to go its own way!!
Thus we have a nature reserve which is neither reserved nor natural! No wonder the non-ecologically qualified RAG members struggled to come to terms with what was being done to their favourite local green space and, among all this obfuscation, it was not easy to make any meaningful contribution to the first management plan! Effectively it became a question of "Trust me, I've been to university and done a degree in conservation etc." All becomes easy to those who are allowed to define their own terms without being challenged.
In fact as has been said many times since, it was not so much a question of being qualified in the new disciplines of conservation, wildlife or ecology, but more having picked up the various tricks and strategies that management courses bestow. Chief of these is to start off knowing exactly what you intend to do and with little tweaks and touches here and there make it look as if the ideas have come from other people who will have to live with them, because sure as anything there will come a time when these people will realise that they've been "sold a pup".