Historic wild camping tradition on Devon moor outlawed

The owner of an estate on Dartmoor has won the right to remove people 'wild' or backpack camping on his land.

The high court ruling on Friday has been seen as a test case for countryside access.

Dartmoor was the only area of England and Wales where under a local law there had been an assumed right to wild camp without the landowner's permission.

However a High Court judge ruled this was legally wrong and permission was needed.

The case had been brought by Alexander Darwall, a hedge fund manager, and his wife Diana, who have owned the 4,000 acres (16 sq km) on southern Dartmoor since 2013.

At a two-day hearing last December, lawyers for the Darwalls argued that a byelaw in the Dartmoor Commons Act 1985 which enshrined a historic custom of open access "to all the commons on foot and on horseback for the purposes of open-air recreation", excluded wild camping.

The judge, Sir Julian Flaux, chancellor of the high court, agreed. He said the act did not "confer on the public any right to pitch tents or otherwise make camp overnight on Dartmoor Commons. Any such camping requires the consent of the landowner."

He also said there was "no local custom of camping which has the force of law".