Scottish Government Introduce Land Reform Bill
The Scottish government has introduced its much-anticipated Land Reform Bill. Minister for the environment Dr Aileen McLeod published legislation on the 23 June pledging “to end the stop start nature of historic land reform”.
The bill will include a requirement on the Scottish Government to have a statement on rights and responsibilities over land, and issuing guidance to landowners on engaging responsibly with communities.
Alongside this structural reform, the Bill brings forward a number of practical measures, giving communities a right to buy land to further sustainable development, which applies in both urban and rural Scotland.
Key measures in the bill include:
- Ending rates exemptions for shooting and deerstalking estates;
- Creating a Tenant Farming Commissioner as part of the Scottish Land Commission, along with other modernising elements of Scotland’s tenant farming legislation;
- Encouraging better information and greater transparency on the ownership of land, through the land register;
- Strengthening the regulators hand in instances where land owners are failing to take their deer management responsibilities seriously;
- Improvements to both systems of common good land and right to roam.
The full Scottish Government statement is available here.
