Roaming the British countryside is our right – we must fight to preserve it | Land rights
Those questions used to be thought of as straightforward. In the immediate postwar period, a mix of socialist principle and concerns about the health of the British people came together to create the National Parks and Access to the Countryside Act 1949 â a law designed to open up the land to everyone. The national parks were of course the flagship achievement: but the act was also supposed to lead to a definitive map of rights of way in England and Wales, with local councils drawing up a draft version within just three years. It never happened: many customary paths were indistinct; conf...