National Trust launches ten-year strategy with £1bn commitment to improving its properties

The National Trust has launched a ten-year strategy in which it promises to spend £1bn on conservation and repairs, and names climate change as the single biggest threat to the places the Trust looks after.

The Trust’s strategy Playing our Part – What does the nation need from the National Trust in the 21st century? says the charity will also develop new economic models of land use, continue to improve its properties to teach and inspire, and do more to safeguard green spaces.

Dame Helen Ghosh, director general of the Trust, said: “The protection of our natural environment and historic places over the past 100 years has been core to the work of the Trust but it has never been just about looking after our own places.

“The natural environment is in poor health, compromised by decades of unsustainable management and under pressure from climate change. Wildlife has declined, over-worked soils are washing out to sea; villages and towns are flooded.

“Millions of people love and cherish the great outdoors, it’s vital to our sense of well-being, our identity and our health. But beyond that nature also supports us in all kinds of other ways, from flood protection to carbon storage. We can’t keep taking it for granted.

“Our strategy calls on the National Trust to respond to these threats and play its part in new ways.”