"total non-commercial movements is down from 1,171,000 in 1986 to 694,000 in 2013. I suppose this doesn't give the whole picture but it doesn't paint a pretty picture! "
I think this is movements from licensed airfields and is probably misleading.
In the 1980's most movements were from licensed airfields. Back then my local licensed airfield was quite busy. There were few local strips and all had very few aircraft. The licensed airfield got steadily busy till around 2003. In the last 10 years the licensed airfield has become much less busy, we have had a large increase in strips and their are lots more aircraft based on them. Many more aircraft locally than in the 1980's.
Rod1