a)     

The Park had settled into a new normal approach and had been working without restriction for six months. The Park and Country estate continued to act as the green lung for Plymouth and had recently welcomed thousands of children to a week long activity session;

b)     

The Country Park and Estate had, through various commercial activities, become financially independent from Plymouth City Council and Cornwall County Council; 

c)     

COVID had a negative impact on the Park in relation to its core volunteers which had significantly reduced. Chris Burton advised the Joint Committee that they had been attempting to rejuvenate the volunteer programme;

d)     

The Park Manager had been working on drafting a development plan which included a buildings development plan in consultation with Historic England, it was hoped that the Development plan would be with the Joint Committee for approval in approximately two years;

e)     

Parking machines had now progressed to provide payments over the phone and it had been planned to increase the offer to include machines that could accept contactless payments. This would support a move away from solely cash machines;

f)      

Numerous events at the park continued to take place consistently, the park would cover its costs through ground rent or through a percentage of turnover;

g)     

Lady Emma’s cottage had been a success story and was a derelict property until a private individual bought the lease and set the cottage up as a holiday let. Through the Park Managers connections another individual visited the cottage and bought the cottage before returning it to the Park for its own use.

h)     

The English Garden House got to the last six for a previous heritage lottery fund bid. The Country Park and Estate had been in discussions with Catherine Marlow with a view to receiving possible future grants. Should this be unsuccessful the Park and Estates would pay £20,000 a year on the building;

i)      

The Holiday let portfolio saw the introduction of Rame Head lookout in May 2022, this had also been converted from a disused building and provided the park with increased revenue. The Holiday let portfolio had recorded high levels of occupancy throughout the year and the Park had established a good partnership with Classic Cottages;

j)      

The Park manager continued to ensure that the park was free to everyone and balanced its different user groups effectively;

a)     

The Garden Battery would tell the story of the house, Battery, Park and its role in Plymouth Sound as a critically important defensive structure for Plymouth;

b)     

All reports completed for the Park would be made available on the Mount Edgcumbe website. All papers relating to the Joint Committee would also be published on the website;

c)     

The Park continued to look into bringing electric bikes and scooter to the park which would link in to other areas in the region;

d)     

Sea grass would be looked into as to whether this could be brought to the Park;

e)     

The park continued to progress as a deer park and had fenced half of the area with the other half coming to a halt due to difficult ground conditions, There had been issues with dog attacks this year and plans had been progressing to re-educate people;

f)      

Over the ensuing two years the park would look to make plans for electric vehicle charging stations and the Park Manager had been looking to make changes to the highways and fleet vehicles towards electric;