After the pandemic restrictions of the past two years in the United Kingdom, a small, stir-crazy contingent of ramblers, hikers, backpackers and other assorted nature lovers are demanding far greater access to the countryside. In a campaign called “The Right to Roam,” they are calling for private landowners to be required to open up far more of their rolling acres to the general public.

“We don’t want access to everyone’s land. We don’t want to walk through people’s back gardens. We’re talking about huge estates, many of which have been in the same families for hundreds of years. We’re talking about big, open landscapes, woodland and rivers,” said Jon Moses, a prominent member of the group.

“Ninety-two percent of the [countryside] in England is off limits to the general public. Ninety-seven percent of the rivers are not navigable by the public. This has to change. And we’re prepared to trespass to make the case for change.”

Standing next to a barbed wire fence on the perimeter of a 5,000-acre privately owned estate in the county of Herefordshire in the west of England, Moses puts his beliefs into action. Wearing skin-tight leggings so that his clothes don’t snag on the wire, he climbs over the fence and into the estate.

“This is not a crime unless I cause damage,” he said, “and although it is an offense under civil law, landowners rarely sue unless you cause damage or an obstruction. But I believe that I should have a legal right to be here, to wander and enjoy and get my fix from the natural world.” 

Right to Roam has helped to organize a series of mass trespasses to get that message across. The latest, in privately owned woodland called Worth Forest around 30 miles south of central London, attracted more than 250 trespassers.

As well as promoting the roaming cause, they were also protesting against plans to build a large leisure resort in the forest. Although there are footpaths allowing access to some of the site, the public is not entitled to visit most of it. It was precisely this relative lack of access, said protest organizer Dave Bangs, that had rendered this ecologically rich woodland vulnerable to development.

“We cannot champion its rare, beautiful, important, weird wildlife and landscape if we’re not permitted to know it and fall in love with it. And that’s why we’re here,” he declared through a megaphone.

Bangs then led the trespassers on a 4-mile trek through the prohibited parts of the forest. There was singing and poetry reading en route, and, in a clearing, Bangs read a list of the forest flora and fauna that he said the development would endanger.

Among them: bristle club-rush, bog pimpernel, shining dumbledore, delicate germanderwort, golden-ringed horse stinger, flagellate feather moss and many more.

Some of the trespassers looked like militant eco-warriors, well used to a bit of lawbreaking, but some did not, like retired company director Richard Payne. Didn’t it bother him to break civil law?

“Not really, because I’m not breaking and entering somebody’s house,” he laughed. “I’m not squatting. I’m not going to go in here and put up a tent and live here. So, in a sense, we’re not strictly trespassing.” 

Retired deputy head teacher Peppy Erskine also felt she was doing nothing wrong.

“I just feel it’s so important that we preserve the natural world for our mental health. So I feel justified in trespassing,” she said.

And the Rev. Peter Owen-Jones, an Anglican minister, added: “If human beings had never challenged the rules, we’d still be living in the Dark Ages.”

Britain’s landowners, on the other hand, have condemned the outbreak of mass trespassing and criticized the call for unrestricted access to the countryside. Victoria Vyvyan of the Country Land and Business Association speaks for the owners of some 10 million acres of managed land in England and Wales. 

“We believe passionately that access to open spaces and to green spaces contributes to people’s physical and mental well-being,” she said. “But the best access for the greatest number comes from a properly mapped and managed footpath system and open access that already exists.”

England and Wales, she pointed out, have 144,000 miles of public pathways. England has 10 national parks covering 10% of the country. She’s worried that unrestricted roaming would clash with farming and forestry activity and possibly put the roamers in hazardous situations. Sensitive conservation sites could also be adversely affected.

“We’re suffering from a catastrophic decline in biodiversity in this country. And I’m afraid nature and people don’t go terribly well together,” Vyvyan said.

Nature certainly doesn’t go well with developers, say the Right to Roam campaigners. They accept that there must always be some exclusion zones, where delicate ecologies, vulnerable livestock or physically dangerous activity are involved. But they believe that one of the best guarantees of the mental and physical health of the nation — and of its biodiversity — is a much wider right to roam.