Mayor calls for ban on disposable barbecues

The mayor of York and North Yorkshire has called for disposable barbecues to be banned as he prepared to visit the site of a devastating wildlife caused by a naked flame.

David Skaith told BBC Radio York that he was in favour of a ban on selling the portable grills ahead of his trip to view restoration work on Langdale Moor in the North York Moors National Park.

Last summer a major fire on the moorland was found to have been caused by a campfire that had been lit in a remote location.

Skaith also answered questions about bringing banking services back to high streets, plans for a tourist tax or visitor levy, and a £1 bus fare for passengers aged 19 or under.

A report found the Langdale Moor fire, which burned for more than 40 days last summer and covered a vast area, was likely to have been caused by cooking with naked flames.

The government has announced support worth more than £3m to help the area recover.

Skaith said: "This was a fire on a scale we've never seen before, caused by a naked flame. While a disposable barbecue wasn't the cause of this fire, the risk they pose is clear, as they have been linked to the cause of moorland fires elsewhere in Yorkshire. We just don't need them.

"If you look at the damage that something like that caused, not only the cost to wildlife, to businesses, the millions of pounds, the stress.

"Thank goodness there was no loss of life. This was a fire on a scale we've never seen before. We just don't need them."

Other moorland wildfires in Yorkshire have been attributed to the use of disposable barbecues which had been abandoned on dry ground - such as this one in 2019 on Marsden Moor, near Huddersfield.

The mayor welcomed news that a subsidised bus fare scheme - allowing people aged 19 or under to travel for £1 - has now been used by 3m passengers.

The scheme started in York in 2023, using government funding, then was extended into North Yorkshire in 2024 before being backed by mayoral money in April 2025.

Skaith said: "Three million people have used that under 19 bus fare cap, that is absolutely massive. Something we are really pressing on with now is franchising - we really need to change the way we deliver buses."

Franchising - or taking buses back under public control - is currently being trialled in five parts of York and North Yorkshire.

The mayor also said he and his team are "exploring" the possibility of getting electric buses onto the streets of Scarborough.

"We'd like to see as many electric buses as possible in the patch. There is one of the country's biggest electric bus builders in Scarborough," he added.

Skaith said his team have identified "quite a few places" across York and North Yorkshire that have "no access to cash whatsoever" because of bank branch closures.

"It is about how we can work with private companies - who work in a very different way - to bring cash back onto the high street.

Communities with restricted access to cash include Bentham, Tadcaster and Sherburn-in-Elmet, Skaith said.

"Big national banking companies are probably not going to open a whole new high street bank. We need to find a way to work it differently, because these communities need access to cash.

"We will have this plan going out very soon," he added.

The mayor took multiple questions from the audience over his plans for a tourist tax, or visitor levy.

He has said a possible levy of £2 per person per night could generate up to £52m a year locally.

One questioner asked Skaith what would stop people choosing East Yorkshire for a holiday, where there are currently no plans for a tax, should one be introduced in York and North Yorkshire.

The mayor said: "I fundamentally believe it's the right thing to be doing. We have an opportunity to raise much-needed income, to drive investment into growing and improving the visitor economy, and promoting and bringing more people into the region."

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