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The history of New Labour is highly politicised, deployed either for its policy lessons (good or bad) or as a weapon in Labour’s factional struggles. But just as historians in the 1990s reassessed the premierships of Harold Wilson and James Callaghan, so the distance of time and the opening of archives offers an opportunity to reappraise New Labour as history. Such work raises five acute methodological challenges: the lack of sufficient distance from the subject to tell whether policy innovations will remain popular and permanent; the long shadow the Iraq War casts over this whole period; the deluge of data and sources available; the continuing and controversial part that key actors, such as Tony Blair himself, are still playing; and the lack of expertise any one author will inevitably face in some policy areas. This article addresses each of those difficulties in turn.

England’s ‘right to roam’ continues to be a misnomer which is uneven in scope and inclusivity. While the Countryside and Rights of Way Act 2000 opened access to privately owned mountains, moors, heaths, and downs, the changes were not as bold as they at first seemed and access was still restricted. The 2000 Act was representative of the contemporary atmosphere in which concern for accessibility and inclusivity was strongly qualified, with a focus on non-disabled walkers at the expense of others. Though physical disabilities were now better catered for, much less was said about intellectual disabilities, race, ethnicity, place, income and transport. Such issues have gathered increased awareness in recent years, but more remains to be done if access to the countryside is to be more equal. This paper examines how ‘right to roam’ and access legislation developed, and how engagement with disabled people was limited from the outset.