A FLY-on-the-wall documentary about the late Lake District businessman Mark Weir is to air on television for the first time tonight.

The owner of Honister Slate Mine was being shadowed by a BBC film crew right up until his tragic death when his helicopter crashed on the night of March 8 this year.

The hour-long documentary will be shown at 9pm on BBC Four and is called “Tales From The National Parks.”

The episode begins a three-part series which concerns the trials of trying to run a business in the heavily-regulated National Parks of England and Scotland.

It was shot by the acclaimed film-maker Richard Macer, of Platform Productions, based in Manchester, who followed Mr Weir around for nine months up until the accident.

Mr Macer is a three-times Royal Television Society award-winner making documentaries about the legendary Happy Mondays and Black Grape frontman, Shaun Ryder; as well as glamour model and television celebrity Jordan, aka Katie Price.

The episode reveals the frustrations Mr Weir endured having spent over two-and-half-years and thousands of pounds trying to win planning permission from the Laqke District National Park Authority for a high-level zip wire, and battling Natural England following the introduction of the award-winning tourism experience, the Via Ferrata.

“I was looking into the idea of conflicts within National Parks and found out about the plan for the zip wire and that’s what led me to Mark,” said Mr Macer.

“The series asks what are our National Parks for?

"When they were first established in 1951 what the Government of the day was doing was saying the landscape in these areas is highly prized and needs to be protected for everyone to enjoy.”

“But today not everyone takes pleasure out of the landscape in the same way so the zip wire plan for Honister and the Via Ferrata were good illustrations of those arguments.”

For the first time, the documentary sheds light on Mr Weir’s frustrating behind-the-scenes battles with Natural England.

There is also an on-screen altercation with environmental pressure group, The Friends Of The Lake District, which campaigned against the zip wire plan.

It also features interviews with National Park figures such as Chief Executive Richard Leafe, and Jean Johnston, of Natural England based in Kendal.

“I think Mark was under pressure and it was a lot to deal with although he didn’t show it a lot,” said Mr Macer.

“He had a lot on the line because he had built Honister up into an extremely well-liked local business.

"Jobs were on the line and the Via Ferrata was an important source of income.”

Following Mr Weir’s accident, the company was fined over £30,000 in a successful prosecution brought by Natural England, while Honister’s zip wire plan was flatly rejected nine votes to five by members of the National Park’s Development Control Committee.