A step beyond belief

You have to laugh or else you would end up topping yourself. In fact I suspect most of the world laughs at us and our loony elf 'n'safety obsession.

Derbyshire County Council has cemented a load of limestone slabs on top of the stepping stones over the River Dove in Dovedale near Ashbourne because the centuries old stepping stones were a bit uneven and were getting a bit worn.

The council say there was a large discrepancy in levels from bank to bank, which as one who has leapt across them like a gazelle (admittedly like a heavily pregnant, inebriated gazelle, but a gazelle nonetheless) it was all part of the appeal and fun as was the fact Izaak Walton had written about the stones and walked across them.

But we can't have fun, or a chance anyone might fall off or get feet wet in modern, sanitised, soulless Britain so on go a collection of slabs. You have to wonder why the council didn't just bridge the gaps and pave the whole thing over to provide wheelchair access as well.

There is already a protest movement and a Facebook group complaining and demanding restoration and walkers and hikers are just flabbergasted that anyone could carry out such cultural vandalism - but this is councils we are talking about here.

The council claim they have had positive comments from the public and the National Trust while the National Trust say that the work has improved the condition of the stepping stones and made them more accessible - funny how jobsworths, managers and elf'n'safety zealots love that word accessible. As for the public who made positive comments? They seem to be pretty quiet amid the complaints.

NT claim that in time the nice level, faced blocks will weather in appearance which is not really the point. The National Trust incidentally is hardly a good guide to go by in any case. This is the organisation which closed a formal walk around an ornamental lake at one of its properties until a risk assessment had been carried out. I wonder how many pages it took to state if you walk too far off the path you end up in the water.

This probably ranks with laying tarmacadam down on the track up Snowdon in terms of daftness but you do wonder where it will stop. Reduce Beachy Head to a gentle slope perhaps so people can't throw themselves off? Who knows.