Is (Landed) Property Theft?
July 21st, 2006 by Stephen
The right to roam in the countryside has at last bee established in law in the UK, and thus far there have been none of the devastating invasions of ramblers, forming ant-like colonies across farmed land, stripping crops and causing mayhem. It all seems quite successful.
It seems to me that the right was a long time in coming, and owes much to an antiquated view of land as property, which owes more to the generation of Locke, and those who stole the common land from the commoners.
That is to say: we should not need a “right to roam”, if we had a more sensible view of the land on which we live as inherently common.
My view is that people should not be able to own land as property, but rather they should be allowed to own a package of rights on the land. One could deal with the right to roam by decoupling the right to sole access from the other rights, except in certain circumstances (e.g., around dwellings).
This would allow a much more sensible aproach to walkers on land. As in Scotland, people would not be guilty of an offence unless they actually caused damage on land over which they roamed. Why is it that England and Wales are so backward on this topic? European laws on the subject tend to be much more liberal (the advantages of having revolutions maybe?)
