MP urges national parks 'to act on water safety'

An MP has called for greater action to prevent drownings in the Yorkshire Dales National Park following the death of 13-year-old girl.

Palwasha Akbar, from Bradford, was rescued from the River Wharfe at Burnsall on 31 May but later died in hospital.

Speaking at a Westminster Hall debate, Sir Julian Smith, MP for Skipton and Ripon, said he had become "increasingly concerned" about a lack of focus on water safety planning in the park.

A Yorkshire Dales National Park Authority spokesperson said "responsibilities for enforcement and public safety were shared across a number of agencies" but that it played an "active role" through education and engagement "to influence behaviours around safety".

Palwasha was one of 19 people in the UK to have died in open water during the recent spell of hot weather.

Speaking during the debate on water safety, Smith also highlighted the death of Azaz Mohmed Chanda, 33, who drowned in the same stretch of water in the River Wharfe on one of the hottest days of the summer in August 2024.

The Conservative MP said national parks had a duty to not only promote their landscape but also "a duty to protect local communities and a duty for safety".

In respect of the Yorkshire Dales National Park, Smith said he had looked through "nearly all the recent minutes, chief executive reports, the risk registers" but there had "never been any issue of water safety come up".

He added: "When you've had two of these deaths at the same spot in the last two years, that cannot be right."

Addressing Emma Hardy, minister for water and flooding, Smith said national parks also needed to take more responsibility for the volumes of people who visited at peak times.

He added: "Last bank holiday weekend and Eid, at an operational level, they had not thought in anyway about the deployment of personnel in hotspots like Burnsall and hadn't really thought through those responsibilities for safety."

He urged the minister to "use whatever powers with national parks, who have large amounts of water, to speak to them and ask them to use their duties for safety."

In response, Hardy, said: "The fatalities we have seen during recent periods of warm weather and the tragic deaths raised so movingly underlie the urgency of the issue."

In respect of Smith's comments, the minister said he had made "an important point about national parks and how they were communicating the role they play."

She added: "I would be happy to pass it on to the natue minister to take away and have a look at."

A spokesperson for the Yorkshire Dales National Park Authority said: "We want the Dales to be a welcoming and safe place for residents and visitors alike.

"The tragic events in Burnsall and the concerns raised by local communities about visitor management are taken extremely seriously."

They added: "We have staff on the ground at visitor hotspots every weekend and bank holiday to try and influence visitor behaviour, and we are currently amplifying RoSPA's national water safety initiative and North Yorkshire's wildfire campaign across our channels."

"We remain fully committed to working with partners to strengthen coordination, improve planning for peak periods, and support the safety and wellbeing of our visitors and communities."

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