Written evidence submitted by Scottish Countryside Alliance
Executive Summary
1 The Land Reform (Scotland) Act 2003 (the Act) covered access; community right to buy in non-crofting areas; and community right to buy in crofting areas. The Act was introduced as part of a raft of measures within the wider Land Reform Programme, which included the set-up of the Community Land Unit in Highlands and Islands Enterprise (HIE) and the Scottish Land Fund (superseded by Growing Community Assets).
1.1 The Scottish Countryside Alliance wholeheartedly supports a range of land ownership and management types based on the fundamental principles of legitimate ownership and the best use of land.
1.2 In our submission to the Scottish Government’s Land Reform Review Group 2013, we put forward compelling evidence of the pivotal role that many of Scotland’s landowners fulfil. Underpinning the contribution of many of Scotland’s landowners is the fundamental belief in, and commitment to, property rights, which seem to be continually under attack without regard to consequence. The Scottish countryside lacks the investment it requires, in part due to the constant reviews of property rights which undermines confidence and discourages long term investment.
1.3 The Scottish Countryside Alliance wholeheartedly supports a range of land ownership and management types based on the fundamental principles of legitimate ownership and the best use of land; indeed we have a range of ownership types within our membership many of whom lead the way in community engagement through their support of land and or bushiness development in partnership. Many such enterprises have been recognised annually through the Scottish Countryside Alliance Awards.
1.4 We believe that further legislation or substantive change to Scotland’s land reform legislation is unnecessary but concede that some of current legislation may need to be reviewed so as to be made more applicable and better at fostering the collaboration needed to deliver maximum public benefit. We would advise that as landowners are already determined to act responsibly within the regulatory framework, change and improvement can be best achieved through community engagement and the dissemination of innovative ideas and best practice, not more legislation. Case studies, as an example, provide a more positive and constructive stimulus and encourage buy-in whilst more legislation tends to act negatively and encourage polarisation.
1.5 We contest the principle that there is demonstrable evidence to support a more diverse landownership pattern and we see no evidence of any democratic mandate to drive this. In this call for evidence we have identified the obstacles to improved rural development, sustainable communities, and an enhanced relationship between people and the land.
About Us
2. The Scottish Countryside Alliance (SCA) is a devolved policy and budget centre of the wider Countryside Alliance. The SCA is recognised by government and voluntary sectors as a representative body for country sports and community interests in Scotland.
2.1 Our mission is to promote and protect Scotland’s rural and wider countryside and the well-being and continued prosperity of those who live and work in it.
2.2 The Countryside Alliance has over 100,000 members many of whom are directly involved in a wide variety of rural landownership and rural business management throughout Scotland, all of whom are vitally important to the continued prosperity and sustainability of rural Scotland.
2.3 Today landowners’ business interests are very diverse and for the majority their landholdings are relatively modest with many managing 500 hectares of less. Whilst diverse in size and makeup, Scotland’s landowners take the responsibility of land stewardship extremely seriously and are significant contributors to the health and vitality, as well as future economic sustainability, of the rural sector.
2.4 We work with key decision makers to ensure that all aspects of our countryside are enhanced, not diminished. We also have to ensure that people living in rural communities are adequately supported. Without people in our rural communities, there will be no countryside tourism and no county sports. The SCA ensures that the voice of the countryside is heard by the public and key decision makers. It is in everyone’s interest that Scotland’s countryside thrives and offers opportunities to everyone, regardless of where they live.
Land Reform
3. The Scottish Countryside Alliance believes that there is a lack of clarity over the rationale and remit of Land Reform in Scotland. The Land Reform (Scotland) Bill Policy Memorandum states that its objective is 'to remove land-based barriers to the sustainable development of rural communities' (Scottish Parliament, 2001). However, it is not clear what form this sustainable development should take, or what these ‘barriers’ are or what the Bill’s priorities should be. For example, some have proposed that the Bill could focus on reversing local economic and environmental decline, whilst others have suggested it could play a role in increasing the population and economic activity of rural communities (SQW, 2007; SQW, 2009). It is not clear whether the 'land based barriers to the sustainable development of rural communities' referred to by the Scottish Parliament primarily concern land ownership or land stewardship, as both are likely to be important in terms of sustainable development and different measures would be required for each. For example, many of the potential benefits associated with land and asset ownership may not be achievable through community ownership alone, as benefits such as increasing the financial viability of land and improving local services also depend on how these are managed.
3.1 The Scottish Countryside Alliance (SCA) strongly supports the objective of the sustainable development of rural communities through increasing the opportunities for them to undertake and control the development of their environments. However, the SCA rejects the thought process that barriers to sustainable development will be removed simply by increasing diversity of land ownership. Given the agricultural marginality, population scarcity and isolated nature of certain tracts of the countryside, parts of it simply cannot be economically sustainable without sources of external funding.
3.2 The community/tenant absolute right to buy dominates the academic literature in comparison to either access rights or the crofting community right to buy. Arguably that perception remains despite the fact that it has had little direct use in purchasing land or other assets for community/tenant ownership. Aside from the challenges thrown up by the administrative processes of the community right to buy and the need to manage potential conflict with landowners’ interests, much depends on the human and financial resources available to a group with regards to whether they will engage with the Act. It remains the case that most community groups’ experience of the Act has been confined to going through attempted or actual registration of an interest to purchase land, with no actual gain of land or assets.
3.3 The impact of Community Right to Buy (CRtB) has been commented on by a number of researchers. The Joseph Rowntree Foundation states that the benefits of CRtB (in terms of its ability to change the pattern of land ownership in Scotland and facilitate large-scale community asset ownership) appear to have been relatively small scale. (JRF, 2010). MacLeod et al (2010)
3.4 Many of the observations made in relation to the community right to buy are equally applicable to the crofting community right to buy. Indeed, the challenges associated with the definition of the crofting community, mapping of the land to be purchased and balloting of the community make it an even more daunting process to embark upon than that of the community right to buy.
3.5 The Crofting and Community right to buy opportunity has struggled to inspire communities to take up ownership for a number of reasons, but fundamentally, prospective applicants are failing through the lack of a financially viable business plan as opposed to an unresponsive or hostile landowner. Research highlights that not all communities are equally well placed to achieve the full benefits of land and asset ownership. In addition, without the right conditions in place, ownership can bring with it more risks than benefits. (Aiken et al, 2011; JRF, 2011; Skerratt, 2011).
3.6 The Scottish Countryside Alliance (SCA) welcomes the principle of developing further the ability for more people in rural and urban Scotland to have a stake in the ownership, governance, management and use of land, which will lead to a greater diversity of land ownership, and ownership types in Scotland. However we may have a different understanding of what constitutes success in relation to Land Reform in Scotland.
3.7 We believe that landowners and private estates in Scotland are sometimes unfairly portrayed as being separate from their local communities and cited for holding back or prohibiting development. This is an inaccurate generalisation. Landowners in Scotland are not the standardised stereotype some portray, but come in all shapes and sizes; individuals, trusts and communities. Whatever the ownership type they are all engaged in diverse economic activity delivering sustainable economic growth throughout Scotland; which is far more important to Scotland’s communities and economy, than simply asking “who owns the land”.
3.8 The Scottish Land Fund (SLF) was set up by what was then the New Opportunities Fund, now the Big Lottery Fund (BIG), and represented a major new source of funding for asset-based community development in rural Scotland by providing a new mechanism to support ownership activities along with the Land Reform (Scotland) Act 2003 ('the Act'). It was administered by Highlands and Islands Enterprise (HIE) in partnership with Scottish Enterprise, and delivered through HIE's Community Land Unit.
3.9 The fund was launched initially with £10m and was supplemented in 2003 with a further £5m. Its main objectives were:
4. Under the SLF 239 grants were awarded which amounted to £13.5 million. The average grant size was about £56,000, though the five largest grants together accounted for just over half of the total SLF budget. The fund helped 188 community groups to own their own land and assets. Around 5,500 people have worked directly as part of these groups.
4.1 The SQW (2007) evaluation identified limitations of the SLF. Firstly, it states that the value of the grants awarded will not make more than a modest change to the pattern of land ownership in rural Scotland. It also states that land and asset ownership facilitated by the fund cannot be seen as an end in itself. The SQW evaluation concluded with a number of key lessons learned which it hoped would inform the development of the successor to the SLF (Growing Community Assets).
4.2 The Scottish Countryside Alliance welcomes the introduction of policies designed to encourage and facilitate the transfer/sale to communities of land and other assets in the ownership of government, its agencies and local authorities, which have been taking shape at both a Scottish and UK level for some time. One of the earliest such measures, the Transfer of Crofting Estates (Scotland) Act 1997, making possible community ownership of croft land presently owned by Government. The Forestry Commission Scotland (FCS) National Forest Land Scheme (NFLS), dating from 2005, is similarly intended to enable communities to take charge of state-owned land, and has led to a number of such transfers, some of them involving substantial areas. Furthermore such moves, this time with an urban as well as rural focus, are integral to the thinking behind the Community Empowerment and Renewal Bill (CERB) now in development by the Scottish Government.
4.3 The Scottish Countryside Alliance welcomes the community interest in acquiring Crown owned/managed foreshore and seabed resources. It is our understanding that the Scottish Affairs Committee has already inquired into Crown Estate Commissioners (CEC) operations in Scotland. The Committee might wish to return, in a land reform context, to its recommendation that CEC ‘responsibilities for the seabed [and] the seashore’ should be devolved to Scotland.
4.4 Even if all these interests and ownerships can be identified and mapped, the costs and administration involved in transferring stakes in the ownership, of land, may be prohibitive and may outweigh the perceived benefit. A possible solution for simplifying the process of identifying land and ownerships might be for the Scottish Government to consider allowing owners to consolidate old titles by providing technical expertise, grants for legal expenses and surveying costs and a waiver of Fees for recording dues to allow owners to register their subjects voluntarily in the Land Register at no cost.
4.5 A further matter requiring urgent attention in a public asset transfer context is the
operation of EU State Aid rules.
4.6 While there are aspects of Land Value Tax in its purest sense which might be worthy of further detailed consideration in the context of reform of the taxation of land and property, we have concerns that what has been proposed as “Land Value Taxation” by certain analysts in relation to possible Land Reform in Scotland falls well short of the principles of Land Value Tax explained in some detail in the Mirrlees Review. In that review, it is suggested that Land Value Tax would replace a number of other taxes (including taxation of rental property, Council Tax, Business Rates and Stamp Duty Land Tax). With only part of the taxation system currently devolved (a proportion of Income Tax, Business Rates, Council Tax and, from 2015, Land and Buildings Transaction Tax and Landfill Tax), it is not possible at this time to consider the introduction of a pure form of Land Value Tax in Scotland.
4.7 The SCA does not believe that there is a need to change the law of succession governing how a person's property passes on after his or her death. It is our understanding that in Scotland the distribution of a person's testate or partially intestate estate is governed by the Succession (Scotland) Act 1964 - the Act provides for the estate to be distributed in a specific way and according to law to the surviving relatives of the deceased. It is our understanding that the most recent review of succession by the Law Commission Scotland focussed more on how people lived in Scotland in relation to their marital or civil relationship status as opposed to where they live and what they bequeathed after death. Further to this, significant evidence was submitted to the Law Commission review in relation to the detrimental effects of “land fragmentation” where families had differing levels of claim to landed or agricultural holding.
5 The Scottish Countryside Alliance Vision
5.1 The SCA vision is one of community inclusion, wherever possible, where an individual land owner and a localised community, have worked in harmony to achieve many of the objectives within the Land Reform (Scotland) Act 2003 without the need for draconian measures such as community buyouts.
5.2 We believe that evidence sourced from the Rural Analytical Unit and Rural Environment Science and Analytical Services 2012 research, highlights that not all communities are equally well placed to achieve the full benefits of land and asset ownership. In addition, without the right conditions in place, ownership can bring with it more risks than benefits (Aiken et al, JRF, 2011; Skerratt, 2011). These can include financial, legal, social, and environmental issues, which impact on the ability of the land or asset to achieve its full potential in terms of community empowerment. It is therefore important that mechanisms are available to prevent unsustainable applications being advanced, even with the support of initial government funding sources.
5.3 Community land ownership has been defined by the government as “broadly, to mean locally-based communities of various types gaining increased control over, and access to, the physical assets in their locality, for the purpose of exploiting opportunities and realising rural development benefits for the community”. The government’s HIE Community Land Unit’s first objective is “to promote community-led land purchase or management initiatives, including partnerships. However, from the experience of already completed buyouts, it would seem that the amount that can be raised by community organisations, from private or third sector sources – from participant’s contributions, donations, fund raising, etc – is generally quite insufficient to fund the projects. This problem will be compounded in future by the inevitable dwindling of interest from the benevolent community outsider, and as private sponsorship of community buyouts declines as the initial headline and symbolic cases are won.
5.4 These facts are acknowledged by the community on the Isle of Ghiga, one of Scotland’s first community initiatives. The original funding for the buyout came from a Scottish Land Fund grant of £3.5 million (£1 million of which had to be repaid within two years) and a £0.5 million grant from Highlands and Islands Enterprise. The community sold the old laird's house and fundraised on the island to repay the loan. Further grants coming from the Government's Rural Empty Properties Fund for renovating the cottages and one of £130,000 towards a wind farm; a Big Lottery grant is helping modernise the old steadings for self-catering accommodation, they have also taken out commercial loans. They are slowly moving towards financial independence, but at present are still dependent, to a certain extent, on grants and ongoing fundraising.
5.5 "Many island residents have very high expectations of the community trust, but they seem unaware of just how big a commitment is involved both in time and responsibility. I worry sometimes about the strain it can put on people.” Kerrie Redington Highlands and Island Enterprise
5.6 Another sale under the Act, in Inverness-shire, collapsed after the Newtonhill Trust failed to find the funds needed to complete the purchase. In that instance, CKD Galbraith was acting for the owners of Newtonhill Woodlands and had received an offer when the community registered an interest in the land and brought the sale to a halt. As a result, says CKD Galbraith, the buyer withdrew. A spokesperson for CKD Galbraith claimed that the property has been blighted as an investment. “It has been dragged through the marketplace and there is considerable anxiety in the minds of anybody still in the market for the woodland that community interest will resurface,”
5.7 The SCA do not see the need to amend further the Land Reform (Scotland) Act 2003. We believe that the cultural and financial constraints coupled with the need to “manage through a committee “greatly restricts the potential of any new ownership initiative and that targeted communities can best have involvement in the management of land, and or other assets, through an integrated management system and a structured business plan.
5.8 Many of Scotland’s rural and urban land holdings or other assets have been in the hands of individual and extended families for generations; with, by and large a successful stewardship and governance of the land or asset. Much of the Scottish uplands and coast are of little commercial land interest or value, dominated by scrub, heath or heather moorland, the landscape offers more to Scotland’s biodiversity and carbon sequestration than commercial productivity. In the current global weather climate it would be foolish to ignore the heritable knowledge of land management in these rural areas and to allow others to change the management regime in favour of ill-conceived financial reward. Surely the status quo offers and facilitates good stewardship and governance of land and is in the national interest.
References.
The Land Reform (Scotland) Act 2003
The Succession (Scotland) Act 1964
SQW Ltd (2007). The Scottish Land Fund Evaluation. Final Report. 4/5/07
SQW (2009). Evaluation of Growing Community Assets First Year Baseline Report May 2009.
Joseph Rowntree Foundation (2010), The Impact and Potential of 'community right to buy'
MacLeod Research Ltd (2011), Monitoring Responsible Behaviour Among Recreational Users and Land Managers, Scottish Natural Heritage Commissioned Report No.424
Aiken, M., Cairns, B., Taylor, M. and Moran, R. (Joseph Rowntree Foundation) (2011). Community Organisations Controlling Assets: A Better Understanding.
Skerratt, S. (2011). Community Land Ownership and Community Resilience
Tax by Design: the Mirrlees Review, J. Mirrlees, S. Adam, T. Besley, R. Blundell, S. Bond, R. Chote, M. Gammie, P. Johnson, G. Myles and J. Poterba, ISBN: 978-0-19-955374-7, Oxford University Press: September 2011.
Scottish Land and Estates Response to the Scottish Governments Land Reform Review Group
October 2013