Category: Rural Matters

The Rural Matters section is a special section sponsored and reserved for the local CPRE.

The CPRE or Campaign to Protect Rural England is a charity set up to help protect the rural countryside.

In this section you will find articles mainly by Rupert Hardy, Chairman, North Dorset CPRE. There are ocaisonally guest writers but always from the CPRE.

We like that the subject matter is wide and varied, from dark skies, to planning, hedgerow maintenance to Fingerposts.

Always something new and always interesting to read. The CPRE’s main aim is to help make the countryside a better place for us all to live.

Rural Matters

Hedgerows – are they our overlooked climate heroes?

Hedgerows have inexplicably been left out of the climate change action plan, says Rupert Hardy, chairman of North Dorset CPRE Last year we wrote about...

22 November 2022

Local History

The most professional of amateur archaeologists

A visit to Martin Green’s remarkable Down Farm Museum is highly recommended, says Rupert Hardy, chair of North Dorset CPRE Martin Green may farm 260...

10 September 2022

Rural Matters

Dorset gains extra time for Local Plan

Dorset CPRE and Dorset Deserves Better Alliance ask for more consultation as council delays Local Plan, says Rupert Hardy, chair of North Dorset CPRE extra...

14 August 2022

Rural Matters

Where now for Dorset’s small village shops?

Village shops benefitted from the ‘stay local’ message during the pandemic, says Rupert Hardy, chair of North Dorset CPRE – but tougher times lay...

22 July 2022

Dorset community news

The business of Nocturnal Manoeuvres in the Dark

There’s an opportunity for eco-tourism to benefit both our rural landscape and the local economy, says Richard Miles, Dark Skies Adviser for Dorset CPRE England’s...

9 June 2022

Local History