Report calls for reform of 'unhealthy' land ownership in Scotland

[Eugene]

Source: The Guardian

Report calls for reform of 'unhealthy' land ownership in Scotland

Commission set up by Scottish government recommends new powers to split monopolies

Severin Carrell Scotland editor
Wed 20 Mar 2019 05.00 GMT

Scottish land ownership rules must be radically reformed to reverse the concentration of the countryside in the hands of a small number of ultra-wealthy individuals and public bodies, a major review has warned.

The study by the Scottish Land Commission, a government quango, says that in extreme cases where landowners abuse their power they could face compulsory purchase or community buyouts.

The commission, set up by Scottish ministers who are likely to look closely at its conclusions, found that major landowners behaved like monopolies across large areas of rural Scotland and had too much power over land use, economic investment and local communities.

It found that about 1,125 owners, including Highland lairds and major public bodies such as Forest Enterprise and the National Trust for Scotland, own 70% of Scotland’s rural land, covering more than 4.1m hectares (10m acres) of countryside.

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Describing the worst effects of that monopoly power as “socially corrosive”, the SLC warned: “In some parts of Scotland, concentrated land ownership appears to be causing significant and long-term damage to the communities affected.” The eventual goal of the commission would be to break up many large estates.

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Read more: https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2019/mar/20/report-calls-for-reform-of-unhealthy-land-ownership-in-scotland

[mr_lebowski]

1. Can you even IMAGINE the outcry over attempting that sort of Socialism here in the USA?

I sincerely hope they find Trump to be one of those 'monopoly' owners and totally fuck with him in every possible way.

[Denzil_DC]

2. Trump's a very minor player in Scotland, corrosive as he is.

There are far larger "sporting" estates that do support some jobs, but make little profit for the amount of land involved, and the worst of them perpetuate a near-feudal system. Trump did try that approach with his neighbours at the Menie estate in Aberdeenshire, but came a cropper, as the "You've Been Trumped" film documented, and the Tripping up Trump campaign gained international attention a few years ago.

The report also focuses on institutional landowners like the Church of England, the Forestry Commission and the National Trust for Scotland. It's not that these are necessarily guilty of bad behaviour, more that the scale of their holdings can blight other uses of the land and their clout makes them largely unaccountable to the local communities.