 We are just going to start right away. So good morning everybody and welcome to the 17th meeting of this year of the Rural Affairs, Climate Change and Environment Committee. Everyone present is reminded to turn off their mobile phones and so on unless of course you are using tablets for the benefit of your evidence and no other purpose, then that's fair enough. Some of the clerks will be using tablets, some of the members perhaps. I have apologies from Claudia Beamish and I welcome Claire Baker as her substitute at this meeting. Agenda item 1 is the land reform review group final report and the agenda item today is to take evidence from stakeholders on the land reform review group and I welcome all the witnesses. First of all I'd like to go round the table to get you just to introduce yourself not to make any statements. I remind you that the sound system is controlled by the sound operative. You do not need to put on or switch off your own microphones and if you wish to attract our attention we will put you on a list and point out that we have a whole range of questions which will allow you to get to your particular speciality but if you help us please by not seeking to answer every question that is raised by the members of the panel and recognise that this is an early view as many of you have had of a hugely substantial report and therefore it is not going to be the final word in this committee or anywhere else on this matter but a very early review with the minister coming in next week to give us his initial thoughts. Starting with Cara Hylton can introduce herself. I'm Peter Peacock and I'm representing Community Land Scotland. I'm Claire Baker, MSP for Mid Scotland and Fife. I'm Alan Laidlaw from the Crown of State. I'm Andy Wightman, writer and researcher. I'm Dave Thomson, MSP, Skylach Abern Bainoch. I'm Cal McLeod, Rural Development Consultant. I'm Derek Logey from Rural Housing Scotland. I'm Nigel Dawn, MSP, Angus North and Mounds. I'm Billy McGee, Forest Policy Group. I'm Alex Fuggs, MSP for Galloway and West Dumfries. Patrick Cralzer from the Scottish Crofting Federation. Jim Hume, MSP for South Scotland. Nigel Miller, NFU Scotland. Angus MacDonald, MSP for Falkirk East. I'm Angus McCall, Scottish Town Farmers Association. I'm Graham Day, MSP Angus South. As the convener of the committee, I'm also the MSP for Caithness, Sutherland and Ross. I'd like to kick off about the consultation process. We know that it's been in three phases. I think that the important thing is to get to the final phase. But members might like to explore this with you, but I'll kick off by saying, we've had a consultation process. There's been some concern about stakeholders being consulted at the earlier phases, but that they're being less direct consultation at the final phase. How do you, as stakeholders, feel about that? We've had a list from the land reform review group of the bodies who have been discussing things in the final phase, and clearly that's more likely to be representative groups rather than individual stakeholders. Is there anyone who wants to comment about that? That's good. Please, Nigel. Obviously, this is quite a scholarly document, and it covers a huge spectrum of issues, and some definitely don't impact or not directly on our members. However, there are definitely trickle-down impacts on farmers, both land or owner-occupiers and tenants. I suppose that some of the implications on land use affect agriculture as well, and I suppose that we felt that some direct consultation with NFU Scotland would have been helpful at an early stage. In reality, we've never had direct impact on or contact with the group at all, although we ask for it. We have slight concerns that we've got to the stage without that. Anyone else? Is Sarah Jane? We were slightly criticised in the first stage for having too much stakeholder engagement with the land reform review group, but following the evidence session in June from Alison and Robin, we did believe at that stage that there would be further consultation during phase 2, not just with stakeholder groups, but with individuals who brought evidence forward as part of one. And also, many of us around the table are involved in other review groups, other stakeholder groups such as the private rented sector tenancy review group that's mentioned in here, and to my knowledge, as a member of that group, the land reform review group didn't have consultation with those groups either. Okay, anyone else got their point there? Peter Peacock? Yeah, I take a slightly contrary view. I think that after the stage 1 part of the evidence gathering where we put in written submissions, as did many people, and where I had the opportunity of a meeting, I inquired at the beginning of the stage 2 process as to how we would be consulted, and I was told we wouldn't, that we'd made a written submission and they would come back to us for points of clarification if they wanted to, which they did. We, as an organisation, developed some of our ideas that we'd submitted at the first part, and we simply made those documents available online, and I know that they were therefore available to the land reform review group, so to us it met entirely our expectations of the second part. And I think the other thing is we were always aware that whatever they published would be the subject of consultation. Inevitably, if it was making proposals, both to this committee would consult and the Government itself would consult, so we have no concerns at all about the nature of the process. Just for the record, I want to make it clear that we've been told at phase 2 that the land reform review group met with the agricultural holdings legislation review group, amongst others, and that was submitted as a late piece of evidence at our request from last week. Right, we've got Alec Ferguson wants to ask a question. I feel that I must put on record my own concern that a number of the people who have given us written consultation since last week, and I commend them for doing so in such a short period, many of them have referred to the fact that they have not been consulted at all in the preparation of this report, and I would particularly highlight the evidence from the Scottish Moorland group who make quite a play of the fact that they have not been consulted at all in the preparation of it, and I cannot help but feel that given the impact of some of the recommendations of the report on their area of interest, I think that it is a serious weakness that they haven't been consulted. But if I may, convener, I want to very briefly just ask you a question, if I may, because we've had written evidence from Andrew Bruce Wotten. Now, last week, I asked Alice Dr Elliott if she could tell me why one of the panel of experts had seen fit to resign in April, and she said quite understandably that it was a private matter. Now, in his written evidence, Andrew Bruce Wotten, because he was the person I was referring to, says that he made a statement to the group when he felt he had to resign. He said, I believe my statement on this subject to the group is available to your committee, but I can produce it for you directly if that is competent. Given that statement, may I ask convener that we ask for a copy of that statement, because I think that we should know why an advisor with considerable expertise, particularly in landlord-tenant relationships, should know why he felt he had to resign from this group? I certainly agree that we can certainly ask for that. He was one of 10 advisers, I think, that the land reform review group had. So that was not a bad attrition rate, then, I guess, in a complex area. But we'll find out what he said, and add it to our store of knowledge, no doubt. Any other points on the consultation process? Patrick Croeso, first, yes. For the record, to say that we submitted our written evidence, it seems quite a long time ago. In the second phase of the consultation, they did come back and ask us for some clarification on a particular point, so we're quite satisfied with the consultation process and felt that the Federation was involved in it. And reading the report, I think all of the things that we brought up have been addressed for, in some part, at least. Thank you. Andy Wightman. Thank you, convener. The report is a very substantial report, covering a vast number of areas, many, many of which are not even in the remit of this committee. And the amount of work that has apparently gone in to the report has taken quite a considerable amount of time. I'm very aware that those who find this report difficult to deal with, mainly the landed interest, are attempting to undermine its credibility by suggesting that it didn't speak to people that it should have done, that it didn't take evidence that it should have. An adviser has now come out to reveal certain things about what he feels. None of the other advisers have spoken publicly about this, so I think one should be very aware that this is a report that has big implications for the future of Scotland and that people are attempting to do what they can to defend their interests, and part of that is to try and undermine the credibility of it. You're saying it in a different way from what I was slightly earlier. Claire Baker. Thank you, convener. I think that it has been a wide-ranging report, and I have confidence in the consultation process and that it did engage thoroughly with people in the first stage, but I think that we also need to be mindful that they were working to pretty tight timescales. The Government's expectation was a wide-ranging report and on a pretty short timescale, and I think that we'll have to be mindful of that when we think about how the consultation has been conducted. As Peter Peacock just said, any proposals are going to be consulted on and consulted on. Sarah-Jane? Records state that Andrew Byswitain, one of the advisers, actually left this group before the report. He'd seen the report before the report was published, so certainly him leaving the group is in no way an attempt to undermine the report, and he refers to the landed interest. There are many people around this table who have an interest in land in Scotland, and we certainly, as an organisation, aren't seeking to undermine this report or the land reform review process, which we've engaged with enthusiastically. Thank you for that. Let's get past the initial sort of artillery barrage and get down to some of the points, but Angus? Just very briefly, convener, we felt that in the first stage of the report we had submitted evidence and we felt that it wasn't a great account that was taken of it, and tenancy matters were certainly shoveled off to one side. We were very gratified that in the second phase of the report they took far more account of tenancy matters and did a lot of research into it, and they certainly came back to us for points of clarification. So we were certainly quite satisfied with the consultation process. Thanks very much. I think we'll move on swiftly to the ownership of land, which should be useful, and Angus MacDonald is going to lead off on that, and then one or two others, right? So Angus. Thank you, convener, and good morning again to everyone. All the panel members will be aware that the review group recommends that the Scottish Government should make it incompetent for any legal entity not registered in a member state of the European Union to register title to land in the Land Register of Scotland to improve traceability and accountability in the public interest. Perhaps Andy Wightman can come in during this section with regard to the Land Registration Bill that went through Parliament in early 2012, because, if I recall correctly, that suggestion had been ruled out by the Scottish Government, so I'm glad to see it back on the agenda. But perhaps the panel members could tell us whether it's likely to be the most effective way to improve traceability and accountability. I want to start, Andy. Yes, but back in 2012, I have my evidence here from January 2012, I made the recommendation that it be incompetent to register title to land in Scotland's Land Register and any legal entity not registered in a member state of the EU. I made that recommendation after consulting some very senior people in academic law and some people in London who had been raising concerns about the use of property in Britain to launder proceeds of criminal activity. That has been raised in a quinquennial review by Andrew Edwards of the Land Registry in England. It is also in the context of the recent EU council decision to set up registers of beneficial owners of companies in order to tackle tax fraud and criminal money laundering. I'm very clear that what this recommendation is talking about, there was some discussion last week, I'm aware, from Jim Hume about legal entities. I'm very clear that from the argument that's presented here that legal entity in this respect means legal person. It does not mean natural persons. That was certainly never my recommendation to the Land Registration Bill in 2012, so that an American citizen who wants to own land and house or a shop in Scotland is perfectly free to register a title in their own personal name. That's not a problem at all. The key issue here is to introduce transparency and accountability. So I'm dealing with many issues where the owners are in Grand Cayman and Jersey in places and you go round in circles trying to find out who actually owns it and you never get anywhere. So bringing it onshore into the EU brings it into the scope, within the scope of EU company law and makes sure you have accountability because EU law in all member states has open registers where you can see who's responsible for these companies. Very good. Jim Hume wants to come back. Andy Wightman named myself there on a point that I was exploring last week in the land review group because I pushed this with them regarding whether they would be considering somebody from out with the EU if they're wanting a building plot. And they were quite clear that yes, it would be a building plot too. So it seems a bit confusing there but that actual review group were recommending that any non-Europeans would not be allowed to own even a plot of a building plot. And I thought that obviously we'd have repercussions if any of us in our retirement want to go off to Australia and have a building plot there, obviously. So slightly different to what the review group told me on the record. I'm just calling my cloud just now. I couldn't sympathise with Mr Hume if that was going to be the issue in terms of individual building plots for individuals. That clearly wouldn't be a terribly desirable situation but I think that Andy Wightman made the point there and that's a crucial point in terms of defining what a legal entity is in this context. If we're talking about non-individuals then that clearly changes the dynamic in terms of what the point of this particular recommendation is. And it is very much in the spirit of accountability and transparency in relation to land ownership in Scotland which is clearly as I think everybody acknowledges around the table a significant point in terms of taking aspects of the land reform process forward. Peter Peacock on this point. The only part I want to make was that this section of the report just struck me in the way that Calum McLeod just indicated as being about transparency first and foremost and therefore accountability in the back of transparency. And it's also fits in a much wider international context with the EU and more widely in the G8 or G7 perhaps that now is talking about international money movements about people hiding assets doing it for aggressive tax avoidance reasons and these recommendations are designed to get into that and say surely it's reasonable in a Scottish context that people who are affected by the decisions of landowners know who the landowners are. And I don't see it as any more than a very sensible set of recommendations to try and bring greater transparency. There'll be all sorts of detail that would have to be worked out with. That is detail. The key thing is to try and move on the transparency and both the register and the offshoring are both important dimensions of that. Alex Ferguson I totally agree. I have absolutely no difficulty at all with a far greater degree of transparency in openness about who owns land in Scotland. And I think the practices that have been referred to of hiding these in offshore accounts and through companies and all that I've said is abhorrent. And I think it's absolutely right to picture. But what I think this little issue highlights is something that really worries me about several aspects of this report is that a proposal has been put there in black and white without being fully thought through. And it really bothers me that a number of these things and I accept they're all to be further consulted on and I hope it'll be, I hope the consultation will be a lot more thorough than some of the thinking that has led the proposals in this report. Dave Thomson Just now. Dave Thomson Thank you convener. Dave Thomson Ben up. Dave Thomson I think it's the job of this committee to take things further. What you have here is a comprehensive look at issues that need to be dealt with. Recommendations, yes, but plenty of consultation to come yet before anybody makes any final decisions on this. So, and the land reform review group themselves, you know, make it very clear that they don't see themselves as experts, but they've looked at this very, very big subject area they've come up with, general directions they think we should follow. It's up to us now to take this forward and then ultimately the Scottish Government. In terms of the registration of land and so on, maybe to move it away slightly from the legal entity issue, the Government have said they want, and this is a fundamental thing because without knowing who owns the land, an awful lot of the recommendations in here cannot be followed up. They say they want public land to be fully registered in five years and all land in 10 years. What I would like to know from members of the round table here is, do you think that's quick enough? Should we be looking at a shorter timescale? Should we be looking at putting additional resources into registers of Scotland, if necessary? I'm sure there are a lot of architects and quantity surveyors out there who suffered during the recent recession who might be looking for work as well in terms of pulling together the information that would be required for registration. So is 10 years and five years right too long or too short? If you don't think it's right, what would you be recommending to us would be a realistic timescale for this registration? We'll start with Alan Laidlaw and Sarah Jean-Lang and others can come in. Thank you, convener. Certainly. On the matter of transparency I would agree that knowledge of information of who owns what is very important a significant part of the role that we play in Scotland is informing that debate regarding our foreshore interests, for example. We own approximately half of the foreshore and every day more than once a day our office is contacted by somebody says do you own this piece or not and we're able to clarify that for exactly the sort of investigations that Andy mentions and for the reasons that Dave outlined. We've been working on this process for the last couple of years with the registration bill. We've been in long discussions with the Registers of Scotland. We know the minister's position over the five and ten years. We've already written to the minister to say that we support that view and we've already spoken to the keeper about working through that timescale subject to the resources being available. To answer Dave's next question about appropriate lists it is about resource and time. This is not a simple matter. It does take time. We have experience of working with land registry down south and the resource has to be available on both sides of the equation to make sure it's done properly and accurately. But from our point of view we're committed to delivering full registration of our assets in that timeframe and hopefully before if resources are available. Is there a willingness here of Jane to get involved in this process? We already are, convener. If you look at the work that not just ourselves but our members have done in the last couple of years the Clwyd States actually has dedicated staff who currently are working as part of a three-year project with the Registers to ensure that the Clwyd States land and of course all the parcels which have been sold out. I think that that's the hardest part is actually mapping the parcels which have been sold rather than the outline of the estate. That's been going on for some years. We have also had discussions with the keeper about holding workshops because Alan talks about very much that it's a two-part process. There's the registers work but there's the work that has to be done by the estates and other landowners. And I think there are some out there who think it's a bigger job than it actually is. So we've committed with the Registers of Scotland to holding workshops to try and get this done as cost-effectively and as timidly as we possibly can. The 10-year target is ambitious and I do think it will require further resources. If that's to answer that question. Thank you. Yeah, Graham Day. And then Patrick... And not to put Sergio Lange on the spot, but if you've already done all that background work, the wheels are in motion, why is 10 years an ambitious target? I think when we spoke to Beculu about their... And that's in it. Three years just for Beculu which is agreed between the keeper and the estate. 10 years for everything else seems ambitious because they're clearly saying to us that the largest states are actually easier to map than some of the small parcels. So thank you for talking about complete coverage within 10 years. I'm talking about mapping all the hundreds of thousands or tens of thousands of units of land in the whole of Scotland. And we've got Patrick Crocer and Willie McGee after that. Thank you, convener. As you know, the crofters are in the position that they're having to map their crofts. We've pushed for there to be support to community mapping because we believe that that's the only way that's going to expediate the mapping of crofts. I think in answer to Dave Thompson's question whether it's possible within five or 10 years, I don't think it is unless we have a concerted effort and put resources to helping communities to map their assets as groups. I think using the trigger mechanism that's in place now trying to catch individuals and get them to map their crofts individually just presents or creates more problems than solution solved. So I would push the community mapping again for all of the land though. And if I could add at this point as well that the crofters are paying for the registration of their crofts. And I think if we're talking about registering all the land in Scotland in fairness everyone should be paying for their registrations the same as the crofters having to pay. Very good. Willie McGee Well first of all I'd like to apologise for persistent coughing. My point relates to a theme that the forest policy group are particularly interested in and that is how communities and individuals can access areas of land on the forestry state, the national forestry state. So in this I'm only talking about the forestry commission. Now we've been in dialogue with the forestry commission about lotting that's breaking up disposals when they come on the market. And it's quite clear from early discussions with them that they have a real challenge. None of their land is on the register at all. And a lot of it is tremendously complicated to get on the register. And we've you know five years I think is the time that you mentioned for getting all public land on the register. I think that without a shadow of a doubt that if there were resources to be applied then they certainly would be they would require that to get this job done in five years. So that would be that. Christian, what do you think about this? Forestry commission sells off some plots for affordable houses and uses the income for that to actually register their land. Absolutely, absolutely. So a mechanism to fund these sort of things? I don't know the flexibilities and the mechanisms for money in and out of the commission but we've been pushing them very hard over recent forest disposals and to try and trial we would like them to trial two or three. And whilst they seem to be very keen the limitations that they bring up are the legal work that they have to do in terms of registration. Okay, we've got a couple of people Nigel Don and then Andy Wightman. Thank you, Cymru. I'm just wondering whether I could pick up and I think it's what Patrick Crownsor said. I just want to really want to pick up with panellists whether this is an issue about finding lawyers who can write the appropriate deeds or the right words or whether it's sorry, they're not deeds but you know write down the right words or whether it's actually about mapping. Because if it really is about mapping we have aerial technology that surely gives us a detailed map of the Old Scotland and accurately enough. And I come back with Patrick Crownsor's point that surely you don't map an individual my patch of land in the west of breakin you do the entire estate and you just have to agree where those lines are. Is it that simple? Yeah, fair enough. People can comment on that but Andy Wightman first. Yeah, someone has been trying to find out who in Scotland for 30 years. It's a welcome move and as you know in the land registration bill there was a suggestion to have targets every five years and that was rejected. Now we have a very ambitious target. I think the important thing about this is that to recognise that the register of Scotland contain legal information on who owns almost all of Scotland. It may not all be in the land register it will be in the register of say scenes. There's a very small amount that's not even in the register of say scenes because the properties date to prior to 1617 so the University of St Andrews for example doesn't have a recorded title. I don't think it's a particular priority to get this land register complete in 10 years. I think there's big risks in it. I think it's very ambitious. I have direct experience of registrations that have been done where people's houses have been taken in and they shouldn't have been taken in. Because what the land registration is doing the keeper is giving a state and demnified title whereas in the register of say scenes all the keeper is doing is keeping some documents and it's buyer beware whether in fact they know what they're buying and selling. So I wouldn't want to rush this. I know I've been in discussion with members of staff and the registers they're quite concerned about this target. The important thing to remember about the register of Scotland as well as it's a self-financing agency has been since 1982 since Margaret Thatcher came to power and Nic Stepp's agencies. I would be very concerned if the public were to spend money on effectively giving people a very high quality title free when that money could be used to do something else. There needs to be a very proper appraisal done of that. What we could do and I'll be coming forward with suggestions quite shortly is build a non-definitive register that would cover over 95 per cent of Scotland, tell you who owns it, tell you what its value is, tell you who occupies it. And actually that is what a lot of people want. They don't want the legal register, they just if they're planning a pipeline or a new motorway or they want to rent some fields or whatever, they just want to know who to contact. So I think there are measures we can undertake to do that and particularly what's good in the report is they talk about a national land information system. We're wasting an awful lot of money at the moment. The Scottish Assessor keeps their own data, the land register keeps their data, the Scottish Government keeps their data for agriculture administration, Scottish Water and all the utilities have all their own data. I've been looking at maps from the old hydro board, from the old hydro board, from the 60s. They're the most detailed maps on ownership and occupation in Scotland I've ever seen. All this information's there, we could actually build it within two years. We don't need to rely on the legal register to do all the vast amount of work they need to do to make sure that every single line is correct, because if they're not correct you're talking about large sums of compensation because people's land is effectively being stolen from them if they do it wrong. Thank you for that. Alan Laidlaw? I just question I sit on the RICS professional group for Scotland and the interpretation, as Andy says, of the legal position against the maps is the key point of detail. And some of these maps are going back for very, very long times when they weren't on a digital GIS and the width of a quill is 100 metres on the ground plus. So that's the detail of the interpretation of OS data today versus a title from or a plan from historic is the point in detail. I agree with Andy that a lot of this information is already available. The report highlights that I think some like 85% of the data regarding farm IACS plans, et cetera, is already included. Andy's alluded to other systems that are available. Forestry commission and SNH have pretty handy GIS system that you can go into what's in my backyard, click and see what grants are being paid, what environmental schemes are running and what have you. If they've got that data they have another layer of granularity below that. And I think speaking from our point of view there would be no issue at all from most of the larger landowners who most people know anyway of having just a plain GIS layer that as Andy says you can click in to say who do I phone if I've got an issue. Okay. And Claire Baker followed by Nigel Miller followed by Patrick Krause and Sarah Jane Lline. Thank you, convener. It seems when we talk about the register there's two issues. One is about collecting information on what we already know and witnesses have talked about there's a certain degree of information that was all in one place. The other thing that the report talks about is about beneficial ownership and overseas ownership. And the report says that the change that they propose around EU entities would not necessarily reveal the final beneficiary owner of the EU entity but it would ensure it would be covered by EU law. Is there another? When we did the land registration act a couple of years ago there were other proposals about should the register contain information on beneficial ownership. Are there other suggestions? Because the report also said this is one potential measure to address the issues of traceability and accountability. Are there other measures that people on the table think would be helpful when it comes to how we identify beneficial ownership? Okay, well you can pick that up as we're going along, certainly. Nigel Miller? Thank you very much. Really just responding to what Nigel Don has said and Patrick, we're totally supportive of the aims of this registration process and transparency. And as far as most farms go there is good information and good mapping on most farms already in place so it maybe could roll on fairly quickly. I think Patrick's point is probably quite crucial as far as crofting. I think it is a special case. The reality is there isn't good title on a lot of crofts. They aren't well mapped and doing it piecemeal is a risk pay for disaster. And I think it's perfectly reasonable to say that farmers and estates maybe should carry the cost of this process to a degree. But in crofting we don't think that is the case and it's got to be done in a township basis to get it accurate and to sort out the inevitable issues on the ground about boundaries which are not well demarcated. If we actually do it on a piecemeal basis we're going to create problems. And I think that does mean unlike other sectors putting a bit of money into it from government and the present process is actually going to create problems for us. Thank you very much. You need to come back now Patrick at this point. Just a way addition if I could please. Just to restate what everyone's saying that we do need the information. If we're going to reform Scotland we need to know what we're reforming. And in answer to Nigel and as Nigel has said a lot of croft boundaries aren't actually known an awful lot of croft boundaries aren't known which is why we have to establish them through negotiation and using mediation methods to actually get people together. And as Andy said there's loads of information out there but to ask a crofter individually to try and find this information is almost impossible. So again if we do it as groups and it's great to note that registers of Scotland have now or they're in the process of appointing somebody to support communities crofting communities in their mapping. So hopefully we'll see something come from that. And Syrogyn like? Just to pick up on the point that Nigel made earlier you asked about you know which staff have been or where the resources are targeted the clue that's GIS mapping staff that the clue have taken on and they would love it to be as simple as as I said earlier just to map the extent of the estate but I think all landowners and certainly the landowners organisation is quite committed to transparency of ownership and we have said before you know what matters most is who occupies the land who to contact who's making the decision I'm very surprised to hear Andy Andy Wightman saying that that's what he's after because earlier he was talking about the fact that you need to find out who's behind that company because surely if what we're talking about is who makes decisions who to contact it isn't that hard and it could be on a land register light so to speak and I think everyone around the table is committed to delivering that. Taking up Claire Baker's point. Well I have to say I think we've looked at the EU one I do think it has merit in looking at it as an organisation we've been quite clear that there's no way that we stand up for tax evasion, tax fraud and money laundering that Andy is referring to earlier although I'm not aware that there are any evidence that that has actually occurred in Scottish estates traceability, transparency and accountability are the driving force of our organisation so I think it has merit in looking at the EU recommendation. Do you have a final point? Yeah you are just following on from Sarah Chane's point. Would the panel believe that if this were to go ahead and clearly there's a lot of work to go to look into it would it impact on the rural property market and land prices if it were to go ahead? Andy Wightman The land market in general would benefit from a much more streamlined process of land registration and ultimately transfer I mean ultimately we actually want to write out lawyers from this whole process all together I mean you should be able to and you can in some countries simply go online and I can sell you my house online without anyone needing to be bothered I mean the whole history of land registration has been a history of the legal profession blocking it particularly in England because it generates lots of money for them because they're the only people who know how to understand these complex systems so if you have simpler systems with simpler, clearer titles with e-convencing it should reduce everybody's costs Okay Rheona, can I just let's just very quickly put on the record this is something I may not say too often during these discussions and I entirely agree with Andy Wightman on that point Thank you for that I'm looking at public land ownership I think just now Graham Day is going to lead Okay, thank you conveyor The review group makes several recommendations regarding public land ownership including ending the county state commissioners involvement in Scotland and devolting their statutory responsibilities to the Scottish Parliament reviewing and abolishing inappropriate ground property rights in Scots law and the development of a more integrated and ambitious programme of land acquisitions for expansion of the forestry estate I have to say it also some in my view but welcome suggestions regarding common good land I'd welcome views of the panel on these topics And Alan Lathall We've read the report with interest and I think my view personally is that there's a lot of areas that they maybe don't understand the depth in terms of what's involved ownership of assets isn't equal to omnipotent control we manage the assets that we do and we could do nothing without the relevant consents of regulators, planning authorities and others and I think we work very hard to make sure that there's a community buy-in and we need to work in partnership with organisations adjacent to us and those with interests I think we need to really be careful not to narrow our thinking too far on this and we need to be making sure that we're looking to meet the objectives of the group about maximising the stake of communities and individuals in management of local assets about helping communities become stronger and more resilient and about investing expertise in capital and I can see that we can bring a lot too to that opportunity I think there are risks involved in the devolution of some of these assets to local authorities and to Scottish Government you could end up throwing the baby out of the bathwater in some regards and you could end up in a conflicted position in terms of some of the regulators so you wouldn't hand control of planning and regulation of an onshore wind farm to the landowner who was going to benefit from the receipt we see all the difficulties that local authorities get into in terms of allocating housing on their own local authority land or making that so I think the distance between ownership and regulator is something that's been discussed quite a lot in the past for example in aquaculture there was a conflict between the Crown Estate being owner and regulator of aquaculture something we pushed to change back in probably 2007 took a number of years to do so because you end up with a direct conflict with somebody consenting an activity and then benefiting directly from that I think also you know we are doing a lot to work with communities at the moment and I think one of the things we have to look at is the coastal communities fund and the flow of funds back to that and the work that we're doing with other communities so I think there are areas where we need to improve and we need to work more collaboratively and we're working really hard on that I think there are areas that people maybe necessarily don't understand how complex the seabed and foreshore areas are and don't realise the number of competing interests that are happening on the ground and you know you can easily stand on the foreshore and think it all looks quite simple out there but I can guarantee when you start looking at the GIS planning and mapping and different interests in that area you realise that there's a huge potential for conflict and that would potentially stand in the way of the government's targets for sustainable growth of aquaculture moorings and safe navigation and things so there's quite a lot in there that you need to be very assured that it's going to make an improvement to change something like that Callum McLeod, Peter Peacock, William McGee and Dave Thompson want to give them a third point Thank you very much, convener I have to say I find some of that argument slightly perplexing to a degree The Learn from Review group actually in its formal recommendation talks about devolving the Crowdy States powers to local authorities but it then goes on and I think Alison Elliott and Evidence said last week that there's a case for devolving beyond that to local communities themselves and frankly the idea that it's too complicated it's too difficult for communities themselves community organisations themselves and wider communities to actually manage and benefit from the assets on the foreshore and in relation to where the Crowdy State has current governance is ludicrous frankly Peter Peacock I just wanted to follow up really in the same spirit of that Community Land Scotland made a lot of representations to the Scottish Affairs Committee when it was looking at the Crowdy State a couple of years ago and we argued very strongly that the Crowdy State needed radical reorganisation and reform in its management and operation and whilst we didn't address the specific question of devolution to Scotland or whether it was retained at Westminster in a sense we were looking at this back from a community point of view and it mattered more what happened at the local level than how it was managed at the national level we've got no difficulty with that recommendation that it should be devolved in fact we can see significant advantage from that but it's what happens thereafter that becomes important and I can see exactly why the review group are recommending that he could devolve further to local authorities and I think that's got a role to play I think the thing I would like to have seen slightly more emphasise in the report is the latter point that Carlham made which is that we have argued certainly that where a community owns its land already it should have control of its foreshore and an inner zone of the seabed because you cannot really detach the foreshore and that inner zone of seabed where a lot of economic activity takes place from the land these are absolutely connected and I have to just I regret to say this Alan because Alan and I got on very well when we were talking about rugby and so on but I thought his latter comments were patronising towards communities I mean don't tell me in the light of experience we now have in Scotland that people who are running 100,000 acres in south Eust, for example running a multimillion pound wind farm developing a 20 million pound harbour development investing in crafts investing in the land that they're not capable of understanding what happens offshore or what the potential is I think they're absolutely capable but what's more they've got a far greater incentive for doing something about that economically than with respect the Crown Estate have and how the Crown Estate is regarded in many of the communities our members come from is a distant landowner who simply takes rent on the back of other people's enterprise and what we're arguing for and what I think the committee the land reform review group we're arguing for is to turn that on its head and begin to see the incentives to develop being given locally by ownership and by control locally so I think that the direction of travel again there's detail through work term but the direction of travel that is recommended is entirely laudable and to be supported I'm going to say it was an intercepted pass and we'll give Alan Laidlaw another try at the moment I'm not sure my front row legs will get me all the way to the line but we'll see I mean I don't I've never said what you know the suggestion that communities can't manage this I've seen the examples from Peter's members I've spent time doing a lot of engagement with those member organisations that Peter represents and seeing the good work that they do what I'm saying is that we need to be clear that we're coming a long way to acknowledge that we are with Peter on Friday holding a workshop with community membership groups to look about how our local management agreements that we've developed for the last couple of years we've mentioned the committee in the past about how we engage with community toolkits we're also looking at pilot for sure sale to one of Peter's membership groups to help that local control off those assets and that I agree that those people on that in that area are very well placed and positively behind the health and success and vibrancy of that area we work really closely with community groups we'd like to do more there are certain areas that we find difficult to get into those community groups we've worked with a number of different organisations on our LMAs whether it be Portray or Lochmadi where we've put capital invested into that area whether it's talking with West Harris or Gia and others about future opportunities so I'm not saying that we're saying anything about how communities manage that I think the inshore areas are far more interesting I think you have to be able to remind that we take a 20,000 foot view to the strategic importance of the seabed in particular and that's where you start getting into different challenges and it's interesting that the wood group report on oil and gas talked about collaboration of data and sharing and things like that on oil and gas they looked at more emphasis on stewardship of the assets they looked at resource and activity on a regional basis rather than site by site and in response to that there's an arms length body being set up by deck to manage oil and gas now that's what we do for renewables and I think that is something that we need to be clear about that the strategic view at that sort of level is really important to Scotland being successful in delivering on the energy targets and on the economic objectives that we have so I think there's a line to be tread between a strategic asset management and local interest and engagement now that's a matter for government to choose where that goes and how that goes but I think we just need to be really clear that we can potentially offer the best of both in that regard I will part the Crown of State issue just at the moment because there's other people want to come in on public land and Willie McGee's first thank you yes our interest here is in the the national forestry state as in section 13 and really we you know we welcome the and endorse the recommendations that the the land reform view group have made we did find the the section slightly vague there was a lot of de sorry the recommendation the vague but the there's a lot of detail in the actual in the discourse and there's three things we picked up on how to provide flexibility to lease national forest land the creation of starter forests you're all aware of starter farms I've never heard of a starter forest with the forestry commission yet and diversification of forest ownership through national forest land disposals we met with Paul Wheelhouse as a joint group with the Scottish Woodlots Association and after some exploratory legal work the impediment we found was the same as flagged up by the land reform review group to leasing on forestry state it's the definition of community that was the the key element and we proposed an amendment to the public services reform Scotland act 2010 a very minor piece of tweaking which would not only broaden the member of community that would allow groups and individuals within groups that were not for profit that were approved by the forestry commissioners to take leases over forestry commission managed land without changing the forestry act we know that there is a recommendation for a new forestry act and we welcome that that may take some time the creation of starter forests we all know that the forest forestry commission forest enterprise are buying land and in their land purchases we're very pleased that they're going down the route of starter farms we think that new entrant farmers is an excellent idea especially for young people who can't get access to land any other way we would like to propose that they do exactly the same thing with starter forests there is no such thing on the books as yet and that could be for individuals or for groups and we would also like to endorse the recommendation about diversifying ownership and as they pointed out in the report one of the easiest hits if you like in terms of diversification is through forest and the Scottish government has within its power if you like the ability to do this acquisition and then disposal or in disposal sublotting and we've had meetings with the forestry commission they make all the right noises I think this report gives impetus to what we've been pushing for and certainly this opportunity today to give evidence I think will be a further stimulus to them to take action we'll be asking the minister about the state aids issues and the forestry the treasury rules which have been also alluded to in this report so we will take that up with them Nigel Miller Andy Wightman Dave Thomson Alec Ferguson Thank you very much you'll within the report there's a reference made to the land use strategy and that is pivotal in determining your land use in the future and I think repeatedly in the report and in this section as well there's a thought about land acquisition and increasing the forest estate in reality you know the woodland expansion advisory group looked at this and looked at a 10,000 hectare expansion over the next few years and you'll that may be disputed but that's where we are it seems strange that at this stage the land reform group are advocating we go further than that you'll have more aggressive land acquisitions and without taking to balance other other actual strategies you'll also look at the government strategy of Scotland for the drink we're at 5.3 billion exports we're meant to get to 7.1 by 2017 this is 300,000 jobs plus in Scotland and a major export earner and I think you'll to ignore that fact and the balance of other land uses is not right at this stage and you'll I would hope that the committee would review that sort of priority and look at a more balanced approach in reality you know the state or forestry estate you know amounts to 650,000 hectares and if you look at that in comparison to Scotland's farming capability we're at 800,000 or something like that hectares of permanent grass only and 900,000 hectares of arable land now if we're going at 10,000 hectares a year over the next few years we won't have less of that that's the reality and we're also looking at increased production and I think we've really got to accept that our agriculture resources are limited and they're a key part of our future economy and therefore they should be protected and there's also concerns about land values the reality is that forestry acquisition by the state and by private forestry has actually pushed up land values significantly upland areas without a doubt and maybe that is a positive thing and we're also looking at communities and we've seen in the borders and in other parts of the southwest and in the north communities you know dying schools being lost because of large tracts of land being taken out so I think we need a bit more balance in this and we've got to respect the other strategies and the other reports that's got the Government of Action commissioned thank you thank you for that Andy Wightman next very briefly in response to the question but very useful if it is and in many cases I'm not singling you out by any means yep important for the committee to understand that the Crown and State commissioners don't own any land at all all the Crown and State commissioners own is Alan's file here and presumably that pen belongs to his employer the land is owned by the Crown and the Crown and State commissioners merely administer those rights and Scotland used to administer those rights up until 1830 when they went down to London and we're talking about the administration of public rights public Crown rights already Scottish public rights and the Scottish Affairs Committee was very clear on its recommendations and I think Parliament should adopt them on the Forestry commission I think and sorry also the Parliament could nationalise Crown land in Scotland if it wanted to now under its exist under the Scotland Act if it wanted to on the forestry commission I think there's a big debate to be had and I think one of the issues about public land is how there can be greater devolution of control and administration and management if you look at countries like France about 30% of public forests are managed and administered by communes I think we have a very centralised forestry commission Jim Hunter a member described Scottish forestry as being to the forestry commission being to Scottish forestry what collectivisation was to Soviet agriculture so I think we could do something very exciting with the powers that the Scottish ministers have in terms of their land acquisition powers but also important to make sure that those are not used simply to increase the central control in Edinburgh but they're used to revitalise communities and I think we can build forestry in a very different way than we have in the past thanks very much for that Dave Thompson, Alec Ferguson, Peter Peacock and Alan Laidlaw and we're going to move on after a final point from Graham, we'll introduce this section Yeah, convener, just to come back to the Crown Estate issue very briefly it was very interesting what Peter was suggesting in terms of the control for communities that have bought their land it raises the question of course others who own land would say well if community owners have got that right what about us the report recommends devolution of Crown Estate administration as Andy says to Scotland, to the Scottish Parliament I'm very keen personally that it does go down much more closely down to local communities and I just wonder whether some kind of two-tier system might be the ultimate answer with the Scottish Government having a certain responsibility for an overview of certain things and we need to get into the detail of all of that but local communities very much having responsibility for dealing with those issues in their own communities now it might be that local authorities would have a role in that otherwise you need to define what the local communities are but I think it's really important that we delve into that as we go through looking at this report and there's going to be a lot more work done on it these are very much initial discussions as far as I'm concerned I think we're trying to tease out just where we're going so just to put it into people's minds that maybe a two-tier system may be the way forward need somebody to hod the jackets while people argue about what the community writes Sir Alec Ferguson convener, I just want to touch on the forestry issue a little bit Claire Baker and I were both at a confor conference in Edinburgh last week and two things came out of that one of which we've had put to this committee before which is that in 20 years time Scotland's forestry sector faces a real crisis in supply of commercial timber in his speech to the conference the minister Paul Wheelhouse made it quite clear that the future of the commercial forestry sector in Scotland is very much in the hands of the private sector suggesting that the purchasing power of forestry commission Scotland is likely to become less and the private sector will have a greater role to play and without wanting to get into Nigel Miller's understandable concerns about farming or forestry on my own views he needs to be farming and forestry as much as possible but I just wonder how both Andy and Willie feel that the recommendations of the land reform review group as far as forestry is concerned ties in to those two points I made that came out of that conference and by the way I would say I very much welcome the first wood lot in Scotland into my constituency I think that is an initiative that has some future Vor Andy and Willie come in Peter Peacock and Alan Laidlaw on the substantive point and just two or three very quick points and Dave Thompson's point about a two or three tier approach because it might go to a local authority before it went to a community for example that might be a three tier but I mean we completely accept that there is a strategic and with this I would agree with Alan Laidlaw there is a strategic interest in looking at big offshore and other developments which couldn't be done at a community level and may not even be able to put on a local authority level and require to have a wider Scottish view but that apart I would I think that the looking at it in the way Dave Thompson suggests has got real merit I think I just want to really back up what Willie McGee was saying about the potential of forestry and to break up larger forest blocks for communities and for individuals to be able to develop a future around them there are real potential there and I want in that context make the point very clearly that the state aid rules that you touched on are a very significant obstacle to this and I know there's a lot of work being going on and a very helpful decision recently taken where the community in Aegis have been able to get funding from the land fund not with standing state aid and hopefully that points to a new direction but this really requires work done because we're tying our own hands potentially by interpretations of state aid rules that are unfortunate in that regard so I think that that point really needs to be taken seriously where the committee's state aid is a very practical obstacle to progress today I think that's part of a work stream which amongst the many that we're beginning to identify Alan Laidlaw Thank you, convener The piece of ownership came up again and again there I talk about how we manage our assets and how our team in Scotland manage those assets for Scotland What we do is we deliver due to scale expertise and diversity if you look beyond the name of the Crown Estate there is a model that we believe that delivers broadly in community long interests in terms of long-term value sustainability and also preventing these conflicts in the planning system which can really hold up development Obviously the coastal community fund is delivering 22 plus million quid in terms of job creation projects in Scotland between 2012 and 2017 and I think it's that strategic piece that we need to look at and we are engaging with Peter's members we're looking at ways that we can get that local input and management down the ground we've got a pilot scheme with Tovermoreie at the moment where they're looking at their harbour interests and that is very much in the grain of what Peter's talking about about people in the local area having the greatest interest in the success of their areas and I'm 100% aligned with that we just need to be really careful about the bigger strategic piece and some of Scotland's biggest targets in terms of energy in terms of agriculture and the food and drink industry is Nigel that highlighted some really important players in there and then you get on to things like broadband cables and things like that to the islands and these key essential services that we are able to take a very long-term view on and I think one of the pieces in the report that is of a concern to me is that the report says we take a very narrow focus to what we do and we don't take in consideration what our impact is in communities that's something I entirely disagree with without successful communities and activities we are not successful and I think it's a symbiotic relationship that needs to work for both sides and I think it's something that the report has missed entirely I just wanted to tie up the question I think nobody's answered Graham's question about common good and if there was something about forestry then Wally McGee and Andy to finish this section of I just point out that we have 10 questions in our minds that are very broad This is question 3 On common good chair I was the source of the data in here on common good because I'm in the process of writing a report on where we're at with it and it's also the subject of the forthcoming community empowerment bill I'm quite clear that what the report says I endorse we need to have a statutory definition statutory registers and communities should be able to take back these assets that they lost in 1975 they didn't want to lose them in many cases but there wasn't much choice I think communities license to Andrews for example got a private act of parliament to ensure they kept their common golf links ochre machdy, ochre berek did but a lot didn't so I'd like to see these return to the communities if they wish them On the forestry I think we need to have a there's a big debate to be had and understand Nigel's concerns I don't think there's any problem in expanding forestry in Scotland without touching on the best agricultural land we've got vast areas devoted to hunting estates that could still be used as hunting estates but could also be extremely well wooded and I also think relying on the private sector and the way it goes about its business just now is not the most profitable way of building Scotland's forest resource because a lot of the people that own these do it for the tax benefits their investment companies people living down south their absentee owners Russian oligarchs I'd like to see Scotland's forest resource in the hands of local people living resident land owners and communities and we could get a lot more out the forest if that was the case because it would be supporting local communities rather than just being offenced off in closure earning someone a return and we saw the returns available for forest just the other week, 9 per cent I mean loads of money's pouring into it from accountants in London and I just don't think that's the way ahead for private forestry thank you Wally McGee Andy's said most of what I wanted to say and really con for NFU a plague on both of their houses I worked for 15 years in the Scottish Borders trying to find a compromise between industrial foresters and farming and fortunately many of the farmers that we were dealing with in the valleys were not set on maximising production but were rather very interested in diversification and local development in order to keep those schools full and our job was to try and find sufficient forest onto their land that gave them diversification of income so I think there is a balance to be struck I don't think either of the organisations at the moment are doing themselves any favour in that debate Leave that hanging in there Turn to community ownership as a subject and there are recommendations to do with this regarding the right to register an interest over land the right of preemption to buy land the right to request to buy public land the right to buy land the right to request a compulsory purchase order over land in the report What do our witnesses think about the suite of proposed options are they sufficiently comprehensive or are they too detailed Peter Paycock Thanks very much community I wonder if before I come to the specifics of your question community that there's a slightly grating with me I'm not grating that too strongly about the discussion so far that this report is a very comprehensive report overall but it falls into two really distinct parts of the detailed recommendations which we've been focusing on but there's actually some very fundamental principles that lie behind that that I just wanted to touch on because that's what shapes and makes sense of the recommendations I'm going to welcome what they say about community ownership in just a second but like others there are points of detail that I think require to be looked at as Alec Ferguson's mentioned as Nigel Don's mentioned as William Dey's mentioned but in a sense that doesn't belie that reinforces the point I want to make here that this report is really changing the terms of debate about land in Scotland Alice Nellie made a hugely important point last week when she gave evidence to you that land is a finite and crucial resource that requires to be owned and used in the public interest for the common good in other words land is not just a private commodity that requires it's got a public interest she also talked about the need and the public interest the report talks about the public interest in having greater diversity of ownership it talks about the land debate ought to be framed in terms of land ownership as well as land use and not just you can't just leave it to land use because ownership of land largely determines that use Now once you get a hold of these principles then every recommendation from community land Scotland's point of view is part of a coherent whole and whilst there's a lot of detail to be worked out it's exactly why they're recommending such a comprehensive range of things because they're trying to seek to change the concentrated the very concentrated nature of ownership in Scotland make it more diverse and therefore you've got all the detail to help support that Now that comes to community ownership I think the analysis and the report about community ownership is both spot on and very welcome and I think that the person who clearly is behind that in a sense within the land reform review group is possibly the most experienced person in Scotland on the question of community ownership having dealt with it for 30 years and we think they're absolutely right to talk about the simplification of the land format in part 2 but particularly part 3 in the relation to the crofting right to buy and the mapping requirements which are significantly too onerous and probably very unnecessary they talk about there still being barriers to community ownership which I think is absolutely right there are and then the menu of rights that they set out which you have yourself set out community are designed to meet those address those barriers and again we've got strong support for what they are saying the actual right to buy which they have returned quite properly from what it was previously known is an absolute right to buy because actually it was never an absolute right to buy it was a highly qualified right to buy and the actual right to buy we support if it's in the public interest and I stress that the powers of compulsory purchase seem relevant the powers of compulsory sale orders seem highly relevant the emphasis that they place on negotiation as the means to try and secure transfers are also exactly right we think provided there is a backstop power to encourage all of that and the community land agency to facilitate those discussions and support the whole process we also think is absolutely right so we very strongly support all of these recommendations there's a lot of detail to be sorted out about you know what exactly would be the process to exercise the actual right to buy how does the compulsory sale order and the compulsory purchase order fit with a registered interest in land and the rights of community who would have to an actual right to purchase if this went through would auctioning land under a compulsory sale order be the right way and how could communities actually participate in that so there's lots of detail but that's what it is it's detail and that can all be sorted by the committee and by government working on it but the direction of travel and the specific recommendations seemed to us exactly right my plea would be to act quickly on this to consult quickly to encourage government to consult quickly and then use the coming community empowerment bill to maximum effect to try and change as much as we can of this as quickly as we can Sarah-Jane Llym I think to echo the point that Peter made about underlying principles being a key part of this as well as the recommendations but one of the principles which I felt was missing in this section was the fact that deciding not to exercise a right to buy is a sign of an empowered community as much as deciding to exercise a right to buy and I think that's a principle which does appear to be missing from this section I also agree with Peter that the establishment of community land agency should be looked at as a matter of urgency because you have a plethora of willing sellers and communities out there who are trying to find themselves in the way through the process it's some years I'm not sure exactly how many years it is since we had the report about how the bill how the legislation could be improved and it's disappointing that we've waited until now to actually improve the operation of the current legislation I disagree with Peter about some of the elements unsurprisingly we have said before that the CPO mechanisms can be improved the local authorities do have CPO mechanisms and if you are the owner of the only plot in a village which could be made available for housing and you're not bringing it forward for development then there are actions which can be taken and should be taken so I think there are issues within there that we do have some problems with I won't get into debate about the ownership of land but I would urge the committee to help the people who are trying to find themselves through this minefield of the current provisions to deal with that as quickly as possible Thank you for that Callum McLeod and Nigel Miller on this section Don Emill Thank you convener I think in general terms that the fact that the report does amplify and make very clear these principles in relation to the importance of ownership the importance of the common good and the public interest is really important in terms of actually actually bringing land reform from the margins of public policy where it's been residing frankly for the last 10 years to the centre and I think overall the report provides a good framework for that sure there are issues around implementation sure there are issues around technicalities and there will be different views in terms of that but I think that overarching framework is very important and I think the institutional framework which is being suggested is very important to informalising that I came before this committee with colleagues three, four years ago to talk about the research that we've done on the land reform act and part one was to seem to be working well part two was working part three not working at all the options which have been suggested frankly in relation to opportunities for communities seem entirely appropriate in terms of providing a wide ranging menu and there will be different options as Sarah-Jane says for different situations of course but that breadth of opportunity and variety of options seems entirely appropriate I would suggest I think you would agree however that allowing the current legislation from 2000-2003 to bed in was part of the reason why it wasn't front and centre but that in fact your report two or three years ago began to show up some of the problems that were existing with the changes absolutely convenient which is why you're absolutely right there is a longitudinal element to that kind of evaluation but now I think with certainly you know there are opportunities quite rapidly in terms of aspects of the community ownership element legislatively and the community empowerment renewal bill offers opportunities in relation to that I would like to see where within this grand scheme of legislative and other kind of institutional elements the crofting community to write devices as well in terms of amending that because we need not go into any huge discourse as to the issues that have been in that particular initiative and Nigel Miller which is you know touched I guess a nerve with some members the reality is we accept there's going to be wider community ownership and you know that's in the benefit for us all I think the key for us is that the public interest test is robust and that there's an ability to fund and manage the project once it progresses and I think if that's the case then you know we must be positive about this however you know there seems to be a real extensive menu right to register an interest of land right for preemption right to request to buy public land right to buy land and then we go on to compulsory purchase and then compulsory sale orders and also the development land you know a preemptive right there or a real menu you know in our view you know really lets you know try and simplify this process I mean really the preemptive right seems to be pretty you know pretty useful and do you need a right to register an interest in land if you've got a preemptive right you know why do you have these two devices if there's a right to buy land if it's in the public interest and ministers approve it why do you need a compulsory purchase order you know can we not simplify this list and give the key powers that are required and make sure that they're it's simpler for communities it's simpler for land owners and I totally get the idea of diverse land ownership and empowerment of communities but the reality is for many communities some sort of partnership approach with farmers and land owners would be perfectly sensible and it might well be easier to progress because there would be a genuine partnership and there'd be multiple land uses and you know in woodlands and in some access areas that would work perfectly well with our other land uses and I think that you know I regret that there wasn't you know greater emphasis on that partnership approach rather than purely just focusing on ownership which you know may be the right thing in many cases but in many others your partnership approach would actually be very positive for both parties we should be asking the minister about these kinds of things just now I'd like to wrap up this section and take a very short break so Alec Ferguson and Alan Laidlaw thank you I will be very brief I just want to really I think add to what Nigel Millers just said and if I could ask Dr McLeod if possible very briefly I am a fan of community ownership I would like to see more of it in the south of Scotland as well I've talked to Peter Pigog about that in the past but everything I see here suggests a large bureaucratic process with a very sort of central guiding hand on it and why am I wrong in thinking that this is centralising a process that to my mind ought to be a very local one because if you're talking about community ownership community benefit you're talking surely talking about a process that should essentially be a local one in the partnership working in the partnership spirit of partnership that Nigel Millers was referring to but I think I entirely agree it should be in terms of that devolved local context but the problem is that Government does have I think an important role to play in terms of facilitating that sort of opportunity and I think providing resources whether it's in terms of financial support or other types of support is an appropriate role for government to do in that context providing the institutional framework to actually help to facilitate that as well as is very important I think from the context of what government can do because that then balance well what it does actually is two things to begin with it formalises and brings to the centre of public policy I suggest the issue of land reform which has not been there for the last 10 years or so so it provides an institutional impetus for that which potentially could be quite monolithic and could be bureaucratic of course it could and the flip side of that is how you actually design that and make sure that it actually connects on the ground within communities in terms of the types of support mechanisms it provides so that it can then enable communities to untap whatever resources and potential they may wish to utilise in relation to their own locally based development and you can see examples of the last 10 years and before that actually of where the engagement of government policy instruments in terms of different types of support have been invaluable in terms of helping organisations to do that so I don't accept that it's a kind of top down heavy handed dead hand of government argument at all I think it's actually something which can help to catalyse potential within communities A sentence each right or there'll be a sentence in the lot of you Alan, Peter and Andy Wightman and then we'll take a short break at half past two minutes My sentence is that it's got to be fit for purpose as Callum said you know we've got to make sure that the willing activities of both the community and an owner or a manager or an interested party in the area can work because there are a number of examples where you know really good stuff has happened quickly and there's a number of examples where there's been willing in this on both sides and it's taken absolutely years and that's really takes a lot of the enthusiasm out of the community and the owner to make that effort so I commend that it's fit for purpose it's available to people to draw down when they need and it actually is firmly about delivery I think one of the points that was made last week was about you know the availability of that advice to the Highlands and Islands area versus the rest of Scotland and that's something that certainly South of Scotland is is in need of as well at times One click sentence thanks very much Peter Peacock but I just wanted to pick up the point Alex Ferguson made because I share I would share his worry that this could become bureaucratic if it was allowed to and the last thing we want is a heavy bureaucracy or a centralisation of this but I don't see it that way I think these are enabling powers liberating powers for communities to operate and the last thing we want is bureaucracy and I think in that context Nigel Miller is pointing at some interesting questions that require to be addressed about how you keep this simple and Andy Wightman It's very briefly in response to Mr Ferkson I've always argued that all these powers indeed the powers in the land reform act should never have been administered by central government they should be administered by local authorities I think it was a big mistake to do that I think there's been big problems in ministers administering you know what is in the public interest of a small community in Kinghorn why should ministers get involved in that you know we have a very very centralised state I would get all these things down to local authority and ministers responsibility solely should be ensuring that these powers are being used in the public interest generically so that they have schemes that they operate that are fit for purpose but the day-to-day administration decision making should be local in my view well thank you for that we'll take a short five minute break and I mean that because we've got a lot to do because that's only the end of question four so we'll stop now we're going to start on thank you agencies to support communities and oversee governance Claire Baker is going to lead off on this one thank you convener the report mentions the establishment of three agencies one is the community land agency that we've already partly discussed a housing land corporation and a Scottish land and properties commission so I've been interested in members' views on these the one I'd like to make a couple of comments on is the Scottish land and property commission and I think you know I've been interested in what way you think that might respond to some of Keter Peacock's comments around recognising the principles of the report and being able to define what the centre direction is and for me it's also a bit established and short medium long-term targets and plans for how we deliver on some of this and the other thing to mention in relation to that is the comments around the kind of 10-year timescale where we've not had and somebody's not had a lot happening but in other ways the report has identified there is quite a lot of little bits and pieces happened in different parts of legislation but if we look back at the land registration legislation which was taken forward by Fergus Ewing at the time when you look back on the evidence around that it was all you know I don't think Fergus Ewing recognised the significance of that piece of legislation for land reform it was a lack of join-up within government about what was actually trying to be achieved around some of these things so in some ways having the commission maybe gives us an opportunity to respond to some of that but I've been interested in members views around the kind of three areas and there's been a question raised about whether we need three do you think that is do you think the three are necessary to have that level of creation in your bodies? right who wants to kick off on that one Nigel Miller I think we are totally supportive of you know some form of land commission and I think that I suppose our plea would be that you know under the ag holdings review group you know we're certainly looking at you know either ombudsman or we've said in adjudicator and I suppose the adjudicators role will be more about intervening when you know land use or land management is inappropriate and making sure that that sorted out and you might have you know powers of compulsory purchase if that went wrong you know if we're going to a land commission it would make perfect sense to actually try and keep these roles together rather than having two or three different bodies you know operating in the sector and I suppose our view is very much that you know how you operate and the standards of operation of land holdings and the opportunities that they create for others and communities and for the economy and for the environment are the key things in this rather than the ownership so we think that that sort of adjudicator role is pretty important as well as having an overview of of obviously you know the sort of ownership of land as well which you're looking at here thank you Derek Lohie welcome you're in thanks givener just I'll kind of confine my remarks to the housing land corporation and community land agency I mean we said in a written submission that we welcome the promise of the housing land corporation to become and deliver more land in a strategic way for housing in Scotland and to help deliver targets for housing both affordable and another private our main issue is in terms of scale and in terms of how the housing land corporation works with small rural communities and delivers land within rural Scotland and there are certain caveats within the report which suggests how the land corporation is going to work directly with communities or help to understand local housing needs better and if these things come through then great I mean that's something that we look forward to hearing more about but we'll need to more detail about the housing land corporation and for the future things like it talks about the taking land into public ownership at a low but fair price and we really don't have any kind of understanding at the moment as to how they plan to do that and how they will take that forward so the kind of the devils in the detail is it where and also we see a kind of crossover between the housing land corporation and the community land agency because that's the kind of level we're working at which is trying to help small communities buy a piece of land for housing and a lot of the time that can be on a voluntary basis or it can be sometimes trying to negotiate with a land owner so we'd want to see how it fits with that and it's when we have the more detailed understanding of the housing land corporation perhaps understand whether we need both of these agencies or not That's a helpful one. Sarah-Jane from the Bangus, McCall Just to respond to Claire's question about the housing land corporation in here it states that it's about the proposed function of the agency and I think there's lots of functions in there that certainly as an organisation which represents housing providers we would support but our view would be that we actually follow the model which has been taken forward by Highland Housing Alliance the Highland Small Community Housing Trust and Derek Logie's organisational housing Scotland which is about rural housing enablers I don't actually think a national top down housing land corporation is how to deliver for rural communities I would like to see any funding or any approach for affordable housing targeted at local delivery mechanisms where you have the community, base and community planning, base and community needs working with that enabler model so I have to say I don't see the merit in creating a new housing land corporation I think for those of us who've been involved for housing in some times the idea of a national housing corporation has probably negative connotations and we seem to have moved away in terms of rural housing from that national picture to meeting local housing needs I'm going to bring in Graham Day first of all on a small point here before Angus McCall Yeah triggered really by partly by what Sarah James has said I just wonder what scope there is for bringing derelict plots back into use because rural parts of Scotland are absolutely peppered with properties that have been left to fall into state of complete disrepair now most of the buildings wouldn't be salvageable and even if they were they wouldn't meet sustainable current environmental standards but I just wonder if we can have a mechanism and it would probably have to be a national mechanism to acquire or encourage bringing back into use these pieces of land for the purpose of housing A couple of things Graham that we could do I think if you look at planning designations something that the rural housing Scotland, Scotland States and others have looked at is a designation for affordable housing so we refer to it sometimes a rural exception site and they tend to be bigger development sites but if you could categorise that derelict site as a rural exception site which can only be used for delivering affordable housing it deflates the market value straight away so it's not that people aren't sitting there waiting to get the most money that they possibly can I think as well the rural housing enabler model I talked about that's exactly what they do they go around and they look to see what can be used to deliver local housing needs and they work to bring that land back into use it's an excellent model which should be supported and those two mechanisms I think brought together the planning the enabler model and if need be the cpo powers can all be joined together to bring Bride quite a coherent approach to utilising these plots in a better way Angus McCall, Peter Peacock and Andy Wightman Angederek eventually as well yes Thank you convener we've been a great exponent of the idea of a lands commission and in our original submission to the land reform review group we put forward the idea of a lands commission really not just to act as an overarching homitor of the land reform process but also to have a bit more power in interceding in problems on the ground I think now that we are now embarking upon we're in the middle of the first half of a land reform journey and I think it is important that it's that there is some form of cohesion to it and I think we need to to make sure that rather than conduct land reform measures in bite-sized chunks as we have in the last 15 years that there is some overall sense of the direction of travel and I think that I think a lands and property commission is essential to take this forward but I also think that certainly in terms of the the tenancy sector I think we do need some sort of Nigel's causes at the adjudicator we've called it a commission or an ombudsman we need to have some form of interface to make sure that we don't end up in the sort of legal wrangles that seems to happen in questions of disagreements between landlord and tenant and the various problems that beset the tenancy sector so I think as well as an overarching lands commission I think there also need need to be other various other streams which they have not control over but can oversee what's what's going on on the ground We don't have a view in the housing corporation because it's not an area of direct expertise that we have I've already mentioned we support very strongly the community land agency we would have liked to see it as a non-departmental public body but we accepted in our evidence that there were other ways of that this could be achieved and the land reform review group are talking about that as an internal to government agency using existing resources so it needn't be heavily bureaucratic or heavily costly I don't think on the land and property commission in the spirit of what I said earlier about what the principles that lie behind this report are that if land as it is being recommended it should be as a public interest matter and the case that's made in the report that there's been no coherent view of that public interest in the past at really any point in the past and that therefore if you're going to look at this as a public interest matter and the common good long term you require somebody keeping an eye on all of that try to keep it coherent look at where the market is changing where public policy in other respects is changing where we are meeting forestry targets where we're not you know it's community ownership working there's a law require updating all that kind of stuff and it's just seem sensible to have some agency that is doing that now that could be hugely bureaucratic if you wanted it to be on the other hand I don't think that's in anybody's interest and there's no reason why it couldn't be quite a light touch agency you know meeting three times a year with commissioners or whatever on it and a bit of staff resource research capacity to keep an eye on all of this and report back to government and to parliament so it needn't be heavily bureaucratic but it does seem to have a very clear purpose in monitoring all of this long term and trying to make sure we continue to have a coherent view of land as a public interest in common good matter of course inevitably there has to be a land minister a housing minister and a planning minister because they're all different departments so the idea of a coherence in that sense you know makes rather interesting thinking Andy Wightman yes thanks convener when the idea of a Scottish land and property commission to keep an eye on all of this is eminently sensible I think I mean we can see even in the report it covers an awful lot of areas that are not even within the remit of this committee that are in the remit of at least other two committees in Parliament and a lot of things have fallen in between the cracks on in this in the past Clair Baker mentioned the land registration bill the report makes a recommendation on common land for example which I'll be doing something about shortly where a land on the borders has just stolen a huge area of common land and nobody knows nobody had been told very recently knew about it so I think there does need to be some mechanism for keeping an eye on land as a thread running across a lot of areas of public policy from housing to agriculture to the marine environment etc on the housing thing I'm not sure you need a housing land agency if you reform fiscal matters if you reform compulsory purchase powers if you've got these community powers perhaps you don't need that perhaps local authorities could do that but I do think there needs to be some means of going into the market and making land available for housing we used to have new town development corporations they were a very successful model and if you go to continental Europe and Germany and France and Belgium you go and you buy a small plot of land and you build a house it's got a very helpful table here in figure 19 showing actually that you know since 1930 we're now putting much more of our money that we borrow or have when we're building a new house into the land component which is a completely unproductive way of using that money whereas in the continent and Germany and France etc houses are better quality because people are spending a greater proportion of the money they have on the house and therefore getting better quality more long lasting energy efficient houses that generate more jobs so I think there's a lot in all of this thank you Derek Logan That I would say in terms of land values and it's one of the things that prevents any I mean I was on the board of East Logan housing association for 10 years and we never built one rural house because we couldn't afford any of the land that was around the villages and you know we need we need to look at land values and you know we need to look at things like planning exceptions and rural exception sites like Sarah James talking about there's just a point on derelict houses there's another instance from is that in certain areas if you were to pull down that house you wouldn't get permission to build a new one because if you have a you know there's a a presumption against any development in the countryside so I think that's a you know you have to get planning right before you take that forward Indeed well we're coming back to taxation and things like that slightly later Patrick Crouser and Alan Laidlaw um we would support the idea of of there being a commission as you're well aware we're one of the few we're probably the only area of land in Scotland that actually has its own commission and is regulated I wouldn't wish to inflict the the the law that covers crofting on the rest of Scotland thank you but our our opinion has always been the regulation of land is important as Peter said it is land is a common good and crofters have had ample opportunity to state whether they wish to be out of regulation and constantly say no for the common good it's important that we have this regulation and that we have a commissioner a commission with a board of commissioners that oversees how the land is used and and the model that the commission's moved on to is is very welcome it's more democratic and they are trying to deal with things like absenteeism and long-term neglect I think they're under resource to do this but but I think the crofting regulation model is something that we should be looking at for the whole of Scotland Alan Laidlaw a couple of points on the housing say the things I agree with Derek in terms of it local authority approach makes a huge difference you know where it works really well for local exception sites is somewhere where we do a lot of business in Murray and there's a lot of things brought forward and it works really well to the point that there are more plots on the market than probably there's a market for it at the moment that doesn't chime with my own area of East Lodian which again Derek highlighted you know a completely different view I think you have to there's one of the recommendations that I didn't look at in great detail was that support for self-build and I think it's really important that there may be land available but there are a lot of barriers thereafter I have a plot with planning in a house and at the moment I cannot get finance for a number of reasons and I think you know looking to unblock how people get the opportunity to build the house is is also really important and that would help substantially I think Cara wants to take this forward No I was just leading on in my my next question my question next a lot of the points I was going to raise in my question of being covered I think Graeme Dey stole a bit in my question I'm afraid but I mean the review groups made several recommendations regarding urban renewal a new and existing house and including a greater sort of emphasis on public interest led housing development and self-build like Alan's just mentioned and also the introduction of longer and more secure tenancies in the private rented sector so I'd like to hear your views on these proposals in general and in particular about what measures the Government can take to develop a more vibrant self-build sector and going back to the question raised by Graeme Dey is the proposal to give local authorities the power to exercise compulsory purchase sufficient to bring derelict land back into use or our further measures needed just for clarification he was talking about the properties but we're quite right and we want that answered if at all possible without a doubt yep so who's going to respond to that housing Sarah Jane first I'll try and remember all the elements of your question we have to remind me during the thing the security of tenure issue is referred to in this and it's something that the private rented sector tenancy review group has considered the recommendation we have made as a group to Scottish ministers is that we actually get rid of the current tenancy regime and create yet another Scottish tenancy residential tenancy which would be clear, flexible and easy to understand and what it would do is modernise the notice of proceedings for possession so landlord and owner landlord and tenant are quite clear when a property would come back and what that then gives is people clarity and security because they know that if both parties are in agreement the tenancy then that's what they get at the end of it and they get that length of tenure the six months short assure tenancy was always supposed to be used in circumstances in agreement it's become the default and neither landlords or tenants want that to continue so I think that's one thing that we have to do I don't think creating a new mandatory minimum tenancy is the way to do that because that then becomes the default what you have to create is a tenancy regime that works well for both parties that was one self-build the first thing that Scottish Government could do very simply for self-build in rural areas is reintroduce the rural home ownership grant it was an absolute disaster for that to be taken away from rural areas so that's a very, very simple that doesn't require anything else but other than a reallocation of the affordable housing programme, funding programme Other elements you talked about housing in general there's lots in here about meeting rural housing needs that Scottish land and estates rural housing service and others have been calling for for a number of years so we're delighted to see that the needs of the housing needs of rural communities could be met in a much better way than they are at present I've answered some of the questions Donald and Derek Logie and if Caraugh wants to come back certainly I'm certainly pleased to hear Sarah Chayne mentioned need for the return of the rural home home ownership grant and there's also the Crofting House grant as well which was ditched and it will always be good to see that back but just following on from the reference to self-build most of the panel members will be aware of the our island home design competition which took place quite recently and it was to it was asking architects to design an affordable two bedroom home an eco home that's easy to build and cheap to heat for less than 100,000 pounds and I believe the figure for the winner is 70,000 pound for self-build so clearly there's a lot of a support for that from architects in fact I believe there were nearly 50 a different designs submitted which was a healthy competition so with so many architects ready and willing to to get involved what do you believe should be done to ensure that both community landowners and private landowners actually go out there pick up a trail and get building Derek Llewby first Thanks for the mention of our island home because it was the rural housing Scotland which ran that competition and we're really pleased to get as many entries I mean I think we're delivering that in two levels really one with community landowners who will develop housing for rent and at the moment though we're restricted to the construction within our Gail and Bute because it's only in our Gail and Bute that the money is being targeted towards community landowners to build houses everywhere else there's no possibility of getting any money and that's because our Gail and Bute have soft seen fit to use some of their second home's council tax money for this purpose and again in other areas for self-build for self-builders to do the 70,000 they need two things one is they need development finance and a number of mortgage companies are no longer providing finance to help people get to the stage where it's completed never mind the fact the house is probably worth an awful lot more when it's completed than it costs to build so the difficulty getting a self-build mortgage so what could be brought in would be development finance to lend money to the builder to get them to the completion point at which point they could then get a proper commercial mortgage and repay the government or whoever it was to lend them the money and it could be a local authority that did this and secondly is what Sarah James was talking about it was the rural ownership grants it was nowadays with so much land in community ownership and with West Harass Trust for example giving or not giving way but selling plots for 15,000 pounds at Luscan Tyre then what we need is an ability for people to come and build their own houses on those plots and at the moment there's no grant or any assistance to enable them to do that We have Peter Peacock Patrick Krause and Sarah Jane It was really to respond to Mr McDonald's point about community owners we did a recent piece of work an economic indicator study of 12 community owners and I think the really striking thing came as a great surprise to us actually is that perhaps the greatest activity that's gone on over the last five or six years amongst those 12 owners has been housing so there's something like 300 units for housing had been achieved or in the way to being achieved either by giving sites such as in West Harass for low price in joint exercises with individuals where the community gave the land but kept a share of the value through the land in the long term in the house through joint work with housing associations through direct building through renovation of housing so the point I think is when community owners get hold of the land housing automatically rises to the top of the agenda because housing is the essence of how you can sustain your community and there are lots of ways in which the land value because it is community owned and therefore has a social purpose can be brought down and therefore housing can be made more achievable I suppose ultimately in the urban context too and in the rural context it requires the will to intervene and it comes back to this point about land being a public interest in common good matter that requires you ultimately to be prepared to intervene in the market and I think in the report it's such a big report I can't remember where but I suspect that the community sale order could be applied to land and I think there's also talk of compulsory leasing in the report for those vacant properties and so on but that ultimately requires a will to intervene to make these things happen Okay, Patrick Croser We really welcome the fact that self-build has been mentioned in the report a lot of crofters of sort of my generation and an older built their own houses and we do in fact we do have a croft house grant at the moment but this replaced the CBGLS the croft building grant and loan scheme and when the loan was taken away we pointed out that that then limits people very much as Derek was saying there finance is really difficult to get anyway on self-builds it's almost impossible to get and on croft land it's almost impossible to get so the loan part of the CBGLS was really important something that I just want is a highlight as well is that I think that between them the croft house grant scheme administrators and the local authorities aren't encouraging self-build at all and for example the croft house grant scheme stipulates what sort of house needs to be built and it generally has to be multiple bedroom and what we want to see is starter houses where young people can if they're willing to put the work in themselves can build something that's to building standards obviously but can be done on a modular system so start off small and gradually increase in size to make it affordable because otherwise otherwise the stipulations are pretty completely out of the reach of young people in the crofting areas that's well made Sir Agin Lang and Andy Waithman and Dirk to answer Angus's point about what's stopping people at picking up the travels landowners and communities I think there's probably two things we created a grant scheme some years ago rural homes for rent which was available to private landers and community landers and the two things which stopped a number of those pilot projects going ahead and which continued to stop people picking up their travels are prohibitive infrastructure costs in rural areas and restrictive planning and I mean planning in its widest sense it's the roads guys it's the lights guys it's that whole culture that's what's stopping it there's lots and lots of examples of where it's happening I totally disagree with Peter that it's only a community land ownership issue I mean I think that when you look at well managed states and certainly the research from ours housing and housing for to meet local housing needs it's central to landowners that you know the length and breadth of Scotland so address those two things prohibitive infrastructure costs and restrictive housing in the countryside policies to the bane of all our lives at times oh we have had the planning minister here along with the land minister and maybe time to bring them both back together at the same time so Andy Wightman and Derek Logie it's very briefly I agree with Sarah Jane on the infrastructure and all the rest of it in rural context but we've the biggest thing is we've got a completely flawed house building industry in the country and in urban areas where we've got majority of the market is volume house builders who make most of their money from land value uplift they're not actually interested in building high quality houses for people and it's speculative I mean one of the best things to read on this is footnote 17 on page 134 Alistair Parfyns a right to build which won the RIBA research prize which basically talks about moving the UK from a position where less than 10% of housing is self-built to a more normal European level which is 50-60% because that means that more of their available resources go into building high quality houses and it's no coincidence that when Passefhus which is a German standard looked at there I think they had a 50th anniversary recently the number of houses built to Passefhus standard and Britain was the lowest in the whole of Europe because it's volume house builders that build most of our houses whereas in Germany and France and Belgium it's people themselves so they want high quality houses and then just finally on a land is still an issue and land values in rural context particularly no housing plots cost more than £10,000 there's no reason why it's to cost more than £10,000 and if you limited find some way of doing that people could invest their £70,000 or £80,000 that they can borrow into very high quality homes instead of sinking it all into land values Logie is that a solution? Yeah I think so I just saw Sarah Jane trying to get in in terms of Passefhus because dormant estate in Dumfriesgall we did build eight Passef houses through the rural homes rent scheme which showed what an excellent scheme it was Noidart foundation also built houses through the rural homes rent scheme and that's the kind of thing we're talking about rebooting Just to say something like I think it's a quarter of the pipeline projects for the Scottish land fund are communities looking to do housing housing is kind of key issue for many rural communities in terms of keeping their school open their shop open it's a huge key rural development issue and through the Scottish land fund some communities like Alva Ferry have been able to buy land negotiated from an owner had to compulsory purchase it or anything or other and then I just broke ground yesterday to build two houses next to the school which you'll do wonders with the school Not so far away in Iona the community spent 10 years trying to buy a piece of land from the church of Scotland eventually got that land and but are half a million pound short of the construction cost because of infrastructure and planning related issues which mean they have to dig out the site to lower the roof heights and things like that so you know there's over a hundred thousand for five houses over a hundred thousand related just to directly to planning issues 350,000 related to infrastructure issues That's surprising they ever were allowed to build Iona Abbey Graham Day Thank you Cymru and at the risk of taking this off at a slight tangent I want to pick up on Sarah James' first point on the security of tenancies in a rural context and the very unique situation of estate tenancies not just tied properties but you will have people who will rent houses from estates it's not like the normal arrangement where if you rent a flat in Edinburgh you pay the market value you know what your rights and responsibilities are between the landlord and the tenant as you will recognise on estates you can have a situation where you pay a relatively low rent but you invest in the property you put in kitchens you put in double glazes you could live there for 20 to 30 years but you have absolutely no security that reflects the unique nature of the relationship and I just wonder if you would accept that perhaps that's something that needs to be explored to provide tenants in that position with a greater degree of protection Sarah James wants to come back now then Cara to if she wants to find any of the bits at all right sorry Cymru I think there's probably two or three things there I mean I think first of all there's no such thing as an estate tenancy I mean estate tenancies have to operate in the same same situations everybody else so they have to meet a repairing standard they have to do everything else whether they're tied low rent way above market rent whatever you can get repairing standard leases and they are more common in rural areas they have to be at least seven years in length and you have to have a clear agreement between the two of you so that that gives you more security than a normal short of share tenancy I think the improvement Graham is a really really interesting point and actually I'm quite disappointed that the private sector group that's stakeholder group has never actually thought about improvement side of things rather than just because all we focus on is repairing standard getting it up to the making sure that properties in Scotland are at that basic minimum there is at the moment council tenants housing association tenants have that right to improve and get that compensation back for it it's a very very easy to understand regulation you know how it'll work you know when you'll get your you know what money you'll get back at the end of tenancy I can't see any reason why that couldn't be considered in the private rented sector but be private rented sector in its entirety because as I say estate tenancies don't operate in their own little world they operate within the short of share tenancy or even the old regulated tenancy regime as other tenancies do so I think the improvement and making sure that people are compensated for improvements that they do is something that can be looked at the improvements though in the council council setting and housing association are limited and they have to be approved by the landlord I think that that's one thing that we'd look at if somebody's had to pay to get their property up to a repairing standard which isn't improving it it's getting up to the basic minimum standard then that is an issue and that's a failure for the landlord who should be taken to the private rented housing panel Angus McCall on that point Thank you convener there is a quite a complicated crossover between estate tenancies and agricultural tenancies that there's no requirement for an agricultural a farmhouse to be come under landlord registration and there's no quality control as to the state of farmhouses and farm cottages and it's certainly it is up to the the tenant of an agricultural lease to maintain and to repair his property it's the state that the landlord's responsibility to to put good any to renew and replace but there's no onus on the landlord to make any improvements on on tentative properties whether it's the farmhouse or farm cottages therefore unless a tenant can be sure of guaranteed compensation for improvements at the end of a lease he's not going to undertake improvements to cottages to any great extent this is a real bugbear in the tentative sector because in essence it means that landlords will are often reluctant to give permission to for tenants to to improve their cottages or their farmhouses because that is not necessarily going to result in an uplift in rent so therefore a tenant is has to generally speaking has to improve his cottages and his farmhouse on the expectation that he might not get any compensation for it if he was to leave the tenancy therefore unless you're in a long lease there's no way you're going to do improvements to your to to any of your houses and that this is a this is a real problem in the tentative sector and as we get into a more short termism in terms of leases there's less and less investment in in houses and and farm properties as a farm buildings as a whole and I think this is something that you need to be taken on board by by this committee and and by the Agholdings Group when they do their deliberations just a final point on this then from Sarah Jean-Lang and the revolver Angus is quite right that the property occupied by the tenant farmer doesn't have to meet the repairing standard but every other property does Angus I mean I think that's tied to you know a tenant farmer's tractor man or the tenant farmer sublets it those properties do you have to meet the repairing standard this is anomaly that we have raised again and again and I raised it recently in my evidence to the the local government committee in the housing bill but I sensed a lack of interest in rural housing matters around that table I do think it is an issue that interplay between houses on an agricultural tenancy and housing legislation which just doesn't understand ag tenancies however if a tenant makes improvements to houses that is considered at Wagle and I mean I think that's that's quite clearly part of the compensation arrangements that is taken into consideration to disagree over that one okay well we are at question seven now on patterns of rural land ownership and Jim Hume is going to lead in this thanks very much convener part of the recommendations is that there should be an upper limit on the total amount of land in Scotland that can be held by a private land owner or a single beneficial interest in the the group actually recommend that the Scottish Government should bring this into law unfortunately the group didn't state exactly what hectareage that maximum amount should be so it would be interesting to hear from the panel whether they think that the statutory imposition of an upper limit would make a substantial difference to land use what if they do what that limit of hectareage should be should it apply retrospectively and I think we've had problems with retrospective legislation in the past here obviously should it just be for new acquisitions should there be punitive measures accompany the implementation would it simply be a charter for lawyers to make money because larger landowners would perhaps subdivide but have a therefore have a group of businesses owning if that makes sense and is this is this the the right mechanism to address any issues that are out there or should there be other issues thank you we got all day have we discuss right discuss right Peter Peacock first I'm not sure I'm going to address the the fine detail of that question but to me this is one of the most important recommendations in the report and it goes right to the heart of the public interest question that was touching on earlier so we've already got the most concentrated landownership patterns anywhere in the western world it is argued and the evidence is that that is concentrating more now is that in the public interest and for the common good or isn't it and to me you've got to have a way of asking that question I mean for example there's a piece in the press and general in the recently of a landowner who'd been briefing the paper about that landowners intention to move from the estate he currently owns in one part of the highlands and buy up every other estate around it to create quotes an uninterrupted wilderness at the heart of the highlands now is that in the public interest it could be on the other hand it might not be the important point here is that we don't have any mechanism to formally ask ourselves that question ministers cannot formally say or communities cannot represent to the minister to formally ask the question is this in the public interest and to me that's the essence of what the recommendation is about you could argue about the size of holding it could certainly be a trigger for asking that question and maybe the mechanism itself has got limitations on the other hand how do we ask that question in any given circumstance in Scotland and that to me is the important thing now if you go to wider continental Europe this is not unusual there are limits on land holdings and therefore you know we would not be doing anything terribly new in international terms if we actually move to that the UN one of the big international bodies the G8 have accepted through the voluntary guidance on land tenure and which is guidance to member states approved by the member states specifically mentions limiting land holdings as one of the ways of securing the future of land in the public interest in those terms for food security reasons so there is international support for the concept of this if you like if you go to France there is the what's called the safaire system that's how you pronounce it which is a public interest question that can be asked when any land transaction over a certain size I think in relation to agriculture in particular before it's completed then the state either the local state or the national state has an opportunity to see whether they want to intervene in the public interest so to me this is fundamental to a fundamental question it's not I'm not going to caught up on whether it should be 100,000 acres or 50,000 acres in a sense what I think the power of what the committee have said by raising that point is how are we going to answer this question and in fact Alison Elliott herself said you may have a different answer but how do you answer the question that as land holdings grow as they become more concentrated I think she said the moral hazard increases to the public interest so that's what's important and the great thing about the recommendation is it brings that starkly into play and I think we have to find an answer to that as a society are we simply not allowed to ask that question what's in the public interest yes I'd agree with everything that Peter said I mean it's curious that in a crofting context you know you're regulated to the hilt on five acres of bog and rock if you buy a washing machine under higher purchase you have to fill in four pages of details but you can buy as much land as you like in Scotland you can stash it in an offshore tax haven and no one asks you any questions and that's just a complete anomaly so I mean I read this is a quite important principle that if you've got a finite land resource and you want to expand the number of people owning land and the number of people having a stake in land it's perfectly reasonable to have a ceiling and if you want to figure I would stick it at 1% of Scotland I don't see why anyone should own more than 1% of the country and it seems you know already someone owns 1% of the country but if you want a ceiling start start there sounds perfectly sensible Nigel Miller Callum McLeod What equity is at 1%? 1%? 190,000 acres do the maths sorry Thanks Andy no I mean we take your point yeah but you've got to have some point but you start it right okay so Nigel Miller yeah thanks very much I think that this section was prefaced by you know the comment that once you owned land you had the ability to control land use and you had total power and that also you could disempower all those around you if you had a large area of land I suppose I would challenge that whole concept I think your land owning is a privilege and therefore you should operate within certain codes of practice and if you operate in certain codes of practice for the public interests and for your community interests and take those into account and you take into the land use strategy then in my view there isn't a problem and I think it goes to Peter Peacock's comment about the public interest if you're owning land and you're operating the public interests and you're providing opportunities and acts and from our point of view in agriculture providing your long term tenancies and things like that and you're actually operating to the highest standards then that's a positive it's actually an opportunity for rural communities our concern isn't the size of land holdings it's how they're managed and whether they actually fit these criteria and work in the public interests and where they don't work in the public interests then you know some form of intervention you'll meet some capping make certain you know perfect sense if they are operating in the you know for the benefit of the wider community and providing multiple benefits and working with and I suppose the strategy in Scotland may change from generation to generation but they're actually reflecting that then you are view is that this isn't particularly helpful concept but I think it's a matter of intervening where they're failing to deliver and there's real danger as you say especially and we've seen it in certain areas where communities are quite isolated that you know one landowner can have you know a big impact on you know communities ability to function and I think that that's where we should be focusing our attention and actually supporting a landowners which actually invest and provide opportunities and deliver you know a spectrum of benefits committees listening to your views so that we can have a chance to you know ask the minister about these things and but it means you're obviously a codified you know a code so that people are understand what you really require right Callum McLeod Sarah-Jane Lang Patrick Krauser The Scottish Government asks for radical and innovative proposals I suppose this one certainly comes in the radical category some people might debate whether it's innovative or not but I think and I don't want to get into that that debate either about pulling the lever and the answers 42 in terms of what the actual number is in terms of of land in terms of ownership but if this report is about anything it's about trying to put out into into the public domain a set of principles which are going to shape and assist the way in which the land reform process evolves over the coming years and decades there's almost a kind of tacit assumption certainly from from Government in terms of initiating this review that there are challenges and issues around the concentration of land in Scotland so within that context and I agree with Peter Peacock here it doesn't seem at all remiss to be able to ask the question is this a proposal which can help to actually address that now there may be different ways of looking at that table last week talked a little bit about other aspects in terms of fit and proper persons to own land there are some issues around that and let's not forget after all that in terms of community land ownership communities get put through in terms of legislation very significant fit and proper organisation tests in relation to that there may be a certain aspect that can be taken forward in relation to that so I don't think the answer is 42 as somebody once said but I think the question is certainly a very legitimate one to think about and explore in more detail Peter Sarah Jane Lang I'll try and be brief convener cos I can imagine we have quite a lot of points we want to make in this issue as Nigel said this seems to be driven very much by monopoly under control and I think here that the land reform review group is confusing scale with that monopoly of control we heard about East Lothian before if you hold the only development land in East Lothian you are controlling that far more than someone who owns 10,000 acres of the hill rock and bog that was talked about before Peter referred to that large scale ownership approach to deliver a certain land use I have to say that's any far more like the John Muir trust than it did about private individuals but again that goes back to what Nigel's saying it's the use of that land in that ownership's hand rather than the ownership which is driving the issue there scale is an issue but scale can be a positive and that's why you've got storage us you've got Neudard continuing to manage the estates that they had transferred to them at the scale that they got them at it's seen as a benefit to them back to that arbitrary figure that was mentioned it seems ludicrous to me that you'd placed that purely any amount on acreage so you could actually own the whole of Princess Street you could own the pocket of the highest level of residential and be the only landlord in the new town but you couldn't own 10,000 acres of Scotland so I think we have to be clear as to what we're trying to deliver here is it monopoly of control of land use or is it just a punitive measure to say big is bad because the other thing that worries me in here is the negative comments about growing farmers I mean we're being as I just said we're being pushed to be viable productive farmers and yet there's a criticism in here that farmers are selling land to other farmers surely that's actually a positive that we're trying to to ensure the future viability of our farming land so I have lots and lots of things to say about this section convener and we look forward to discussing it further with the committee in due course I would firstly agree absolutely that there's an awful lot to say about this and obviously this isn't the time and the place and will marshal our thoughts in the future something that I think is missing from this a bit is that it talks about maximum ownership and I think it also needs to talk about how many people are using our land and I'm not saying that there should be that there shouldn't be a limit on maximum ownership logically I think there should be a limit on maximum ownership as it says in the report there are now some very very rich people who who potentially could buy most of Scotland so but this thing about how many people are actually on the land and using the land an argument that we always put forward for for the crofting system is is that if you drive through certain parts of Scotland where there isn't crofting there is no one there and when you drive through crofting communities there are lots of people there but the point is that a lot of these these crofters don't own the land the majority of crofters still don't own their land but they have protection and that's that's what's absolutely crucial about this that the people that are using the land need to be protected I mean something sorry to go into what may come up in another section but something that was very significant and it's mentioned in the report was when the common agricultural policy started to become a very lucrative way of earning money if you own land then tenants started to get pushed off the larger estates and this is a form of clearance that's happening now and I think that's something that's very much at the heart of this is about the control and the use of that land and who gets rewarded and multiple amalgamation I'm sorry but I don't agree with you over that the farmers selling to farmers is about amalgamation and these land masses get bigger and bigger and more and more public money goes into fewer and fewer pockets and that's wrong okay that's a strong point of view Angus McCall Peter Peacock Willie McGee and we're going to move on after that I've fed Jim to some points to wrap it up yeah so Angus McCall thank you convener first of all I quite agree with Patrick that there needs to be control over land purchase I mean I think we must be the only country in Europe that doesn't exert some sort of control over who buys land in Scotland and I think the accumulation of vast acreages is not very helpful to rural society I think in many ways I agree with what Nigel was saying that it's not necessarily how the land who owns the land but it's how it's used I think in instances of very large estates I think we need to have some mechanism of looking to see how these estates are being managed and to see whether they are actually being managed in the best public interest are agricultural opportunities being used as much as they could be used is the land being used to its full potential are local communities able to do what they need to do and in many cases you find that there are areas where there is an estate monopoly are not necessarily managed to their best advantage and I certainly have a lot of concern about the increasing disconnect between the owners of the land and the people who rent the land or who work on the land and the group in the middle who are actually managing the land the land agents I think in many cases are not looking far too much at the bottom line rather than the profit line rather than what is in the best interest of local communities we have lots of examples of land on large estates which is not being used to its best ability I think that a lot of it is being driven by CAP, CAP reform but there is far too much land that is being used more as a sump for drawing in subsidy rather than how it could be most used from a productive point of view Peter Beacock A few quick points if I can it is this question of use and ownership that both Sarah Jane and Nigel raised to some extent I think one of the good things really good things that the report draws out is to debate that issue in the report and say actually you can't address the land question in Scotland just by land use because it is a prior step and that is ownership and ownership largely determines the land use in fact they quote the Hurton Institute I think in a quote about them referring to the predilections of land owners largely determining what the use is so I think it's important to recognise that and we support the land reform review group in drawing that point out I guess my last point is the point that Sarah Jane was making about what's wrong with this proposal and it's dead easy I think to pick up all sorts of technical things about how difficult this might be on the other hand if it's not this proposal well which proposal is it because a challenge to those who oppose any intervention well they've got to say is there not a public interest question that society can ever ask and to me that's the key thing you know are we simply saying that there are simply no circumstances ever in Scotland that we're prepared to ask the question is this land managed in the public interest I don't think that's a credible position but there's all sorts of way no doubt of answering that and that's what we need to get into I think Willie McGee To echoes Peter's point we don't have enough diversity in land ownership to see the number of different models of land use we've got this flush of community ownership which we're on current evidence assured is producing more housing more activity we're not quite sure where that's going but I think the point is that this opportunity given by this report and the kind of cut the zeitgeist if you like in Scotland at the moment is a real opportunity to explore new ways of managing land and I agree with Peter that land use and land management it's very difficult to separate them out I have a question just very quickly convener we're moving on to another section after this and we're moving on to agricultural holdings we're coming to that after taxation after taxation we're right okay then I have nothing more to say Jim Hume and I'll ask him the question on taxation in a second but just to sum up it thankfully Andy was the only person who actually was brave enough to state an actual figure and it was about 190,000 acres that was I think about 77,000 hectares but nobody really touched the part of should this be retrospective or it should just be new accusations it's very unlikely that somebody's going to be coming to buy 190,000 acres but there are some I suppose we will have already got 190,000 acres but not that many less than a handful I would have thought so but and Peter Pickup mentioned other European countries and I believe some of the Scandinavian ones or at least one it's only about 700 hectares which is below the average size of a Scottish farm so obviously there's quite a difference in variety there so we're going to have a whole week probability to discuss it and I realise we'll have to get on but I just thought it was worth summing up with on that point Can we leave that on the table because it was certainly us but thanks for making it I like the focus and just Can I just make one point very briefly to Peter the word diversity has been mentioned and I don't think we should lose track of that because as I tried to draw out last week probably very unsuccessfully we have some fantastic examples of where larger states work for the public benefit we have examples of where they don't work for the public benefit one of the things that really bothers me about aspects of this is how you centrally determine what the public benefit is but I think why I appreciate there's an argument about the diversity of land ownership I would argue that we have an enormous diversity of land ownership in this country I think that is a good thing there are good land owners there are bad land owners there are good tenant farmers and there are bad tenant farmers there are good owner occupiers and there are bad owner occupiers it is all that is all part of the rich diversity that makes Scotland the extraordinary country that it is and I the one comment I would make is that if you take this recommend I mean if you take this recommend if you believe that limiting the size of land that anybody can own is going to stop there being good examples and bad examples of land management and public benefit then I think you're going to be hugely disappointed I'm just to end up this section I would suggest that since we've heard from Patrick Krausa you know that we have a regulated market in crofting it's always struck me that in the larger land owner world that we don't have a regulated land market for land ownership as a whole but anyway Jim Hume land taxation payments and markets yes everybody loves taxation of course but the group mentioned that the group mentioned that they thought the current fiscal regime needed to be looked at to encourage an increase in the number of land owners obviously there's I presume they mean smaller land owners one concern there obviously is how that affects the the tenancy market and obviously tenancy market is very important for new entrants there's very very few new entrants that could actually start off as being a land owner so we have to think of the future I presume some of the recommendations they mentioned was ending the exemption of agriculture, forestry and other land based units from non-domestic rates I appreciate the government has rolled this out but we must remember that we're scrutinising the group's report here they also mentioned land value taxation species specific sporting rates to mention a few therefore it would be interesting to hear from the panel what their views on the impacts and proposed changes would have on rural land use yes thank you I mean I think this is a very important part of the of the report and it highlights a number of issues that have never really been properly subject to much democratic scrutiny I mean a very interesting comment was made by a witness from the Institute of Fiscal Studies to the Scottish Affairs Committee when it was looking at this question which was that if you have generic reliefs for example they don't they're not targeted the cost of those generic reliefs is never properly totted up as the recent national audit office report on tax reliefs pointed out the original purpose for granting those reliefs is lost in time and the reliefs themselves get capitalised into land values which then obviously quite understandably get defended by those who currently enjoy the reliefs because it would lead to a drop in land values so we're in a difficult place with some of these things but I do think it needs a very critical examination I would just say on the non-domestic rates point of view there is no longer any rationale for exempting any non-domestic property from rates in my view the original intention the original reason why this was done in the 20s and earlier in England in the 1890s was because agriculture was having a bit of a tricky time so they got some relief and then that relief just became built in until it was completely abolished in the 1950s and it seems to me very unfair from the point of view equity that you know hairdressers and cafes and bus stops and garages and all the rest of it in a small town are paying what are fairly substantial rates of 47 pence in the pound notwithstanding the small business relief scheme and yet large areas of land around big farms commercial forests are paying nothing towards local taxation and the interesting thing about this recommendation as well is if you introduced non-domestic rates to those properties that are currently exempt of course you'd have to do it in a phased way you couldn't just you know do it overnight you'd have to do it in a phased way and possibly quite a long phased way but the key thing is there for most pairs of non-domestic rates if you're to have a finite pot a finite yield from non-domestic rates you could cut their bills and that seems to me of enormous attraction to rural businesses and urban businesses and it's not just the exemptions it's also large exemptions that exist for example for industrial unused property the building that went on fire a few years ago in Glasgow cost an awful lot of money to put the fire out the courts had to adjudicate on insurance claims and all the rest but paying no rates had it been paying rates it had been paying about 750,000 pounds to Glasgow City Council and yet the owner of that property in the middle of Glasgow expects the fire and the police and the court system and indeed this parliament and people to operate society to protect their interests and yet it's paying no contribution so I think it's a very very important point and I think essentially what the report is arguing is that we review these things it's not making a clear recommendation on any one but we review whether they're still justifiable thank you sorry, Willie, Maggie, Nigel, Miller, Patrick, Croust Sarah, Jane, Lang, Peter, people deep breath yes the first policy group we again we welcome the recommendations made in this section and specifically in relation to paragraph 20 in sporting rates as it stands we have a red deer population in Scotland which is something like three times that it was at the end of the Second World War the carrying capacity of the land has been far exceeded we believe that there is not only huge habitat and ecological damage but there's also a large cost that's being borne by taxpayers and that comes in the form of fencing tree protection stalking so people who are harvesting wild deer are essentially allowing others to pick up the tab for their sport and we believe that sporting rates would be one way we also believe in licensing because slightly to one side I think that in order to get a grip on issues such as wildlife crime that sport should be licensed but the rates would allow local authorities and depending on how they were they were collected the public interest if you use Peter's phrase to reclaim some of the costs that are currently being paid for deer damage thank you Nigel Miller thanks very much this is obviously a key area and I obviously recognise this as reserved in many ways but I think it's something that should be addressed by the committee in reality your tax and release will actually drive behaviours and therefore I think this committee has a big role in actually looking about how best practice and opportunity can be driven by your tax regime and my own view is that those that operate to best practice should benefit from reliefs those that actually fail to deliver wider benefits should not and I think that that's a very political question the reality is that these I guess measures have been targeting your estates and larger farms they would obviously ripple down on to all family farms and if we look at land tax and issues at that level on an annual basis and I appreciate the government's already intervened on business rates if we look at projected figures from HSBC they're not our figures margins on spring barley and it's a pretty crucial crop in Scotland and for the whisky industry 26 pounds per hectare projected this year at 165 per tonne and we're into a negative margin if we go to 130 years a tonne if we look at projections for whole farm projections for upland stock farmers with maybe significant cattle hards on in the big sheep flocks the net profit predicted after support 14,000 hill beef sheep units which on higher land looking this year at a lost situation the reality is if you actually push taxes on to these farms their viability and their continuity will be in question so before you look at tax, look at the impacts look at the impacts on food, jobs, communities they will be significant if you look at APR you know this is something which is meant to fragment land use we've seen it used or we can understand that fairness would suggest that there shouldn't be a protection of you know herdswell land in reality without that we're going to fragmented holdings which probably will not be viable in the future and real problems in getting our next generation into land these are pretty crucial issues not just for farming but for the country side we have and for our food industry so you're looking at at two levels this is a really powerful incentive we can use it's also quite dangerous but it's targeted wrongly thank you Patrick Croser and then Dave Thompson I would like to first say that in our submission to the group we said that we agreed with the idea of a land value tax so just to confirm that point what I actually want to draw attention to is that under the section land use payments in the background there's some good context about the common agricultural policy and under point 36 the group says well they point out that there's an increase in concentration to the ownership of farms in Scotland particularly on the better agricultural land and that the group also considers that the value for money in terms of public benefits from public funds for aspects of the cap agricultural subsidy schemes should be much clearer than the case at present and this didn't really get transferred into the recommendation that they make at the end of this which is recommendation 43 so I just want to highlight this because I think you know this is at the heart of a lot of discussion that has been going on about common agricultural policy reform and so obviously it has its place there but it has its place in in this wider aspect of of reforming land use in Scotland because what people what people sort of quite commonly unfortunately commonly people aren't equating CAP with public funding I mean common agricultural policy money is public funds and so this point about having a measure of how well that public fund is used for for public interest is really important to the whole thing and at the moment the common agricultural policy very much leans on providing more money to those that already have rather than it being directed towards public good thank you Dave Thompson I'm very reasonably brief about this please and yeah thank you convener I mean obviously the whole issue of taxation is a very important one it's a very complex one as well and the Scottish Government has ruled out you know moving towards taking away the exemption from non-domestic rates the Scottish Affairs Committee I think have done a very good investigation so far in relation to these issues but they've said they've got more work to do and I would wonder in front whether we shouldn't be asking them to have a very close look at all of those tax issues which are reserved issues and we can maybe look at the ones that are devolved and we can maybe work with them to come to some sort of clear way forward eventually I mean looking at things like land value tax and so on you've got so many taxes and I think the thing with taxes is that if you're going to work a tax system properly you need to be able to adjust and increase some and reduce others to get the sort of balance that you need there's a lot of work here to be done I would welcome you know working with the Scottish Affairs Committee on this of course we might not need them after the 18th of September but there you are so that's really the the main issue that you know I would like to just put forward what what do people think about a twin-track approach if you like between ourselves and the Scottish Affairs Committee on this Last two more we're going to speak on this one Sarah Jane and Peter Peacock unless there's something Jim wants to come back on no doubt Just to agree with what Patrick and both Nigel said you know tax reliefs and any payments are there to deliver public goods and if the tax regime that we have isn't delivering those public goods then there's nothing to be feared by looking at it I think what has to be what has to be behind this is a driver to ensure that APR, BPR everything else that we have is delivering public policy that's why they were put in place and not driven by an underlying dislike of the people who actually receive those reliefs and you referred to a lack of democratic review of the non-domestic rates recently the Scottish Government has just actually reviewed that and it was a full consultation and published its findings of that so I'm not quite sure why Andy feels there was a lack of democracy within that process but again if we're going to look at non-domestic rates let's look at it there wasn't a sort of economic impact assessment I couldn't tell you how much land would be classified as sporting under the sporting rates I'm not sure that appears anywhere in there let's have a look at that let's see what the extent of that is what the public money is and what the impact on any businesses would be and again for agriculture let's map it let's understand what the economic impact of any change would actually be Land mapping suggests itself to me but Henry Peter Pico Yeah I was going to just pick this up as a point of principle I mean it seems to me that it would be a very odd report about land reform in the comprehensive way that this report is if it didn't mention taxation because as Nigel Miller says taxation and changes in taxation drive behaviours and that's what this is about to be driving behaviours so it has to raise the question I mean I guess the political landscape is littered with the bodies of politicians who made the wrong decision about the taxation so I can see why I can see why this is difficult for people but in principle you've got to be prepared to open these questions up if he want to bring about greater diversity of land ownership now whether it's non-domestic rates or sporting rates or inheritance tax or capital gains tax or land value tax I don't know I mean there's a huge debate to be had about that the important thing is that the debate goes forward and perhaps Dave Thompson's got a you know a point whoever is responsible for taxation these matters have to be looked at in respect of how we achieve our objectives for land a few points here and again we could do another with another week on this on this one I was quite concerned when the review group it came back to us last week that they hadn't considered the impact of some of these changes on agriculture and of course you know that's the major rural land use it's also brought up a bit of an anomaly I mean Andy Wightman said you know farms don't pay any local tax at all but of course there's quite a lot of council tax has come from areas and I've just come back to two or three questions before there's a bit of an anomaly that you know the farmhouse if you like especially a tenanted one a tenant in the farmhouse doesn't have any rights regarding their housing perhaps as it's seen as a commercial property the farmhouse is seen as a commercial property but they pay local income tax and council tax usually quite large council taxes as well because there's generally bigish houses so a bit of an anomaly there also so yeah complex indeed okay we move on to agricultural land holdings Dave Thompson's going to lead thank you convener a couple of things here one relation to crofting the report recommending you know reducing the complexity of crofting legislation I know there have been calls to consolidate the legislation but that's a wee bit different to actually reducing the complexity so I would welcome some views on how we would go about that it is a massively complex area at the moment the other issue about selling off government crofting estates at less than market value what folks views are on that and the need for improvement three of the 2003 arc so that's the sort of crofting issues I would like to get some views on and then on tenant farming issues where should the agricultural holdings review group be going there are certain recommendations in here should we be picking up on that and making some recommendations to them in relation to the suggested conditional right to buy and also removing the requirement to register interest so that it's automatic I mean does that really go far enough what are people's views on that but let's take the crofting bit and then okay that's absolutely right right Patrick Croser on the crofting bit Peter Pico on reducing the complexity of crofting law well no it's probably actually it's probably actually quite quick I think there's a tweet from Jim Hunter quoted in the report that says scrap the legislation start again and with a clean sheet I think he says because every successive amendment makes it ever more complicated and my view on this I'm it's probably fair to say that this is my view and my recommendation I make in our organisation rather than it being our organisation's view is that were we to start a system of crofting now I say ask the question would we design a system of legislation that we have and the answer clearly is no of course we wouldn't so the logic there is start with a clean sheet and I know there are um well the the 2010 as amended as amended or is it 93 as amended as amended as amended as amended is being looked at and there's a sump collecting the anomalies in in in the law it started off with a view being given that this isn't about amending the current legislation it's about trying to work out where there's tweaks and that I think having having participated in the collection of the sump I think they realise now that the sump is so big and full of of very serious flaws in the law that that I think we would be recommending that that we start again and I know it's it's constantly said Parliament will not want to touch crofting again it has to touch crofting again because because the 2010 made things worse rather than better on the selling of crofting estates it's an interesting one because this is one that the group came back to us asking why don't crofters use the the 98 act to buy estates that are owned by the ministers and to an extent it's because tenants on these estates have a very good landlord and and they have the protection of crofting law therefore why why change things whether you could sell estates under the market value this is a huge discussion that I don't know the answer to because because the the ogre of state aid rules is always wheeled out at some point when there are discussions about this and it seems to be really difficult to get definitive answers about state aid and and what about these these protests next week although I don't you know you know and on part three there are there are particular points I think I think the um the report covers them all actually there are main ones being things things like this complexity of mapping that's asked for under part three that in no other sphere is this complexity of mapping ever asked for registers of Scotland don't have maps like like they ask crofters to produce it's a it's a complete nonsense a point that didn't come up in the report that we made in our submission was that the um the organisations involved in both part two and three need to um have a structure um as we said and the report says that there needs to be different constitutions looked at but an important thing no matter what the corporate structure is is is that these organisations need to be democratic as we said in our submission in the the third sector third sector organisations have to have a rollover of directors for example and for some reason community bodies I think missed out on this so just looking at how to implement this would be good righto thank you Peter Peacock calm McLeod without going over the same ground just three three points very quickly if you could simplify clofting law absolutely but hopefully you can pass it to the next generation and I don't have to write any evidence papers on it because it's very very very difficult but it's an objective we certainly should indeed indeed on the crofting estate's point about should there be should it be possible to do that at lesser market value or at nil value absolutely yes and in fact the Scottish public finance manual does permit that technically but the incentives for the person that has to make the decision are disincentives they're not incentives and I think and in fact I know the Scottish Government are trying to look at how they interpret that and how they make it work but in principle absolutely it should be possible I would I do want to stress this so that I don't think there's any way that we should be seeking to force crofter crofting communities to take estate it's absolutely got to be up to them if they want to do it and that has to be there clearly expressed well then every facility to help them should be given but we can't force people to do that we're strongly of the view that no community crofting or otherwise should be encouraged against their will to be around this road they've got to want to do it part three of the act absolutely necessary to simplify that the mapping requirements that Patrick referred to are completely tortuous there's no particular reason for them to be there they wouldn't be required in any other facet of our transactions over land so absolutely simplify it but the ultimate power of part three is vitally important about the actual right to buy because that is what is giving rise to the negotiations that are now taking place particularly in the western Isles for the transfer of significant areas of land into community hands that's being negotiated but the power of the act lies in the background to help facilitate that To simplifying crofting law last time I was here I had the imminent crofting law at Derek Flynn by my side and he's not here now so I'm going to skip that particular question but in relation to the transfer of crofting estates the only one organisation that's actually done that West Harass Trust I think they found it possibly akin to something out of a Kafka novel basically they had problems in relation to or challenges in relation to the ballot there are all sorts of issues around aspects of swilling public money from one organisation to another doesn't seem sensible at all so if that can be done at below market value I think there's a very strong public interest motivation to do that and estates are certainly listening if that would be relevant in relation to that in relation to part 3 of the land reform act as the only example of where we've seen that thus far I mean if West Harass Trust had somebody out of a Kafka novel this is taking it off the scale frankly big issues around mapping but there's also one other issue which I think is important too in the general kind of sphere of what we're talking about here in terms of land reform that's around human rights because there's a challenge obviously in relation to the human rights issue with regard to the legitimacy of the park attempted by it and that was found not to be in contravention of that and I think that's a very strong message in terms of broader human rights issues beyond that of the individual which are obviously very important too but I think there are implications in terms of broader issues around land reform in terms of that Sarah-Jane Lang in terms of the crofting landlords as Patrick knows Dr Jim Balfour who chairs our crofting group I always bow I have to say to her greater knowledge when it comes to crofting being a lowlander she tells me I'll never understand it but I have to say crofting landlords are completely on side with this about the need to simplify and make sure that what we have is fit for purpose I think if you're going to look at specifics the paragraph 34 relates to this ridiculous situation you have just now someone makes a minor error in omission their application is thrown out we firmly believe that that should be rectified without delay it's caused a number of willing seller willing buyer things to fall at the first hurdle and the cost to the organised that the people involved has been horrendous as Patrick said so I think that's something that we can do straight away I think park is something that we can all look at and take real lessons of how not to do things I think everyone is quite clear and that also includes the transparency and speed of decision making by Scottish ministers I think it's one of the things that that's shone a light on and if we're going forward to land reform I think that that has to be addressed in any element whether it's part three or whether it's an extension of rights under part two thank you and finally the two people for this section before we move on to agricultural holdings is such Angus Macaul and Wally McGee thank you just a small point about the anomalous position of small landholders who fall between the two stools of ag holdings and crofting law that they haven't had any changes to the legislation since 1931 until the crofting acts in 2007 to 2010 that these crofting acts tried croffin reform acts tried to make a pathway for small landholders to convert to crofting status because as I'm sure you'll appreciate the most small landholders missed out on being designated croffs because they're in the wrong area and the Duke of Hamilton made a very good job of making sure that the island of Arran didn't get crofting status so what has emerged from the crofting reform act is a totally unworkable piece of legislation where the process of trying to convert to crofts particularly if you have an unwilling landlord is almost impossible and the two crofters who've tried it the two small landholders who've tried it have really had to give up and try another route we recommended to the the land reform review group that these small landholders should be allowed to rather than go down the crofting route should be able to have the ability to purchase their small landholdings directly and in fact that was a recommendation made on the island by Sir Crispin Agnew when he came over with us to talk to small landholders I'm glad to see that the review group has recommended a statutory right to buy for crofters which I think for small landholders which I think is only the sensible thing to do they have also recommended that it be on the same basis as a crofting purchase i.e. 15 times the annual rent which is far more sensible than the convoluted process a present of trying to ascertain the value between small landholding status and crofting status and then they have to convert to crofts and then they have to apply to buy the land so I commend that recommendation from the review group to you thank you very much Wally McGee and Patrick Krauser to end the crofting bit of this question very quickly it's about tenant farms section 28 forest policy group we believe there's an omission there and that's in respect of the tenant farmers right to woodlands and trees on a tenant farm we're undertaking a piece of work at the moment to look at the willingness or otherwise of tenant farmers to put more trees manage more woodlands on tenant farms where the situation to be otherwise Nigel mentioned something that's on going just now so we'll be taking that up with NFU and with the tenant farms association okay thank you Patrick Krauser that's the very last thing I just wanted to bring up the identification of the parties involved in land buyouts within crofting law a crofting community is defined as one thing and then under the land reform a crofting community is defined as something else and I think this needs to be sorted out and then also under part three a crofting community can't then make an application to buy under or register an interest in buying under part two so just a really strange anomaly that that same community has to redefine itself and set up a whole new community trust so that needs to be sorted out and then the last thing was about identifying land owners as well I think there's a problem with this Andy mentioned some companies owning land and how difficult it is sometimes to track down who that company actually is and there was an example also in Shetland of some land being sold in auction and being resold and resold so rapidly that it was never being registered and the crofters there have no idea who their landlord is so that needs to be sorted out too Thank you very much Dave's question to the agricultural sector you know the land reform view group have made some recommendations the agricultural holdings review group you know will be in a position probably that they should listen to that so I guess both Nigel Miller and Angus McCall want to sort of lead on this one just now so we start off with Angus and then Nigel Thank you convener from from our perspective I think the land reform review group have made some very common sense suggestions that they haven't gone into any detail and of course you wouldn't expect them to go into detail but I think that what they are broadly suggesting I think chimes exactly with our thinking and I think we would fully support it what we would hope is that the land reform review group have said about ag holdings will be taken will be seen as the context in which that they should be reform carried forward by the ag holdings review group I think that there are two separate reviews one's an independent the other one is a ministerial led one but I certainly hope that the the ag holdings review group under the cabinet secretary would pay particular attention to the recommendations of the land reform group the one that our first recommendation was the to do away with the need for registration of interest to buy land and I for the life of me I cannot understand why it was ever brought in in the first place the area of land is usually fairly fairly well defined and the requirement to register is just is superfluous to our way of thinking the registration of interest does not guarantee the accuracy of the registration so what can in effect happen is that a landlord can put the farm on the market and then challenge the the tenants registration so it's no guarantee to the tenant that his preemptive right is going to go ahead it also there are about 1300 registrations on the on the register of Scotland about nine are there only about 900 or 950 of those which are still live some of those will have dropped off because of the the requirement to to reregister after five years some of them will have dropped off because of challenges but they there are many more to I mean the majority of tenants given the offer of a preemptive right to buy the farm would take it up but a lot of them have not signalled their interest really because of the effect it has on the relationship with the landlord and I think that certainly that the need to to register an interest is shouldn't be there and I welcome that suggestion regarding all the all the other the other comments that the land reform group made I think a bit like crofting we're really looking at maybe starting again with a with a clean sheet we do have an agricultural legislation which is incredibly complicated it's nearly as complex as crofting and it suffered from from years and years of amendments and if you try and look up a legal point you need about six fingers to put in six different books to cross reference I think that what we're needing is some form of perpetual tenancy for the 91 secure sector I think they have indicated that sort of direction of travel with talk about assignation and so forth I think we need to have more flexible models for renting land to allow new entrants in and I think we also need to have some some conditional right to buy inserted not necessarily for the whole farm but the ability to to purchase house and steadings or bits that are needed for diversification enterprise enterprise and so forth I don't want to curtail debate because obviously it's important to hear each of the sectors perhaps Nigel wants to respond to this just now first of all I think we're fairly close to Angus to be honest we support the preemptive right being automatic and we support that these recommendations go to the ag holdings group and we think you know that's a you know that process is to us working well so okay that's good thank you Arlyn Leidlaw I haven't heard from you for at least an hour I think that's not your fault I was being brief as requested convener I think Angus' point about the flexibility and the sort of functionality of the legislation is key because the last thing anyone wants and the you know the area they got greatest concern last week was a charter for lawyers and you know whether it be crofting or ag holdings it gets very complicated very quickly and I think we need to make sure that all legislation in this area is fit for purpose for everybody involved because what is actually happening is there's a sort of delay in being able to get things done that both parties want and I think that flexibility and that pragmatic sort of fit for purpose legislation would be a huge benefit to the sector and to the relationships I'm a firm believer that landlord and tenant must work in partnership to deliver the most that they possibly can from the interest and I think at times where we're at the moment there's quite a difficult dynamic can develop because of the legislative process I think in terms of the right to buy and that's everything I think that's a matter for the review group to take forward further but I think we just need to be realistic about not the point that Patrick makes not everyone wants to buy their asset not everyone wants to take the financial commitment of purchase you know and various other reasons and I think we need to make sure that there isn't one prescription for everybody you know there's some fairly robust sort of views from others that that's not the the only holy grail we've got Alec Ferguson and Sarah Jane Lange I just want to make a very brief point to put on the record really convener that I'm slightly disappointed that the review group looked at this issue just as I'm slightly disappointed it made recommendations on deer management and wild fisheries because these are all areas where there is considerable work going on at the moment with specific groups of expertise to look at these issues and I think it would have been a more helpful position if the land I can understand that they wanted to mention it but I think it would have been more helpful and more conducive to a positive outcome if the review group had simply said recognised that there is a lot of work going on in these areas and left it to those specialist organisations to report I don't expect that to be a wildly popular position around this table but I wanted to put it on the record but who knows Sarah Jane Lange I don't want again to technical specifics as others have said we're feeding those into the eye callings review and I'm sure we'll be back back again very soon to discuss the interim report and the final report from that group but just a one thing that struck us from this section was reading through it I was unclear what the group was trying to deliver is it perpetual tendencies is it churning the sector is it turning tenants into owner occupiers and then reading back why would they want to turn tenants into owner occupiers if they're saying that the tenant farming community is the one that tends to score high in the social measures that it was trying to achieve so I think it's maybe reflective of other parts of it the vision that they're trying to achieve or the picture they're trying to achieve isn't clear so you do seem to have contradictions within this section in terms of eye callings convener thank you very much Dave I think we've exhausted that at this stage very good I'd just like to sum up on timescales and interrelated recommendations we have heard a lot of ideas about whether land ownership is the key determinant of how land is used and there's been strong evidence on that we're looking for realistic timescales for implementation of the reviews ideas there are recommendations obviously need to be made about which parts relate to each other and what cumulative effects the implementation of the land reform review group recommendations would be because we have to think about the future and how it all pans out so there's a process issue here and I wonder if anyone has final thoughts you know very very briefly about how you think we should take this forward I would just suggest that we need several work streams and that perhaps you might want to concentrate on that approach when we then question the minister in a very interim sort of way okay so Sarah Jane lying and then Peter Peacock convener I would agree you can't tackle this in its entirety at one stage I think as well as looking at work streams I would suggest a sort of matrix approach to things that we know we can do now things that we you know are sort of medium term and things that are going to take a long time to really think through and I think work streams but that sort of short medium and the long term approaches is something that we would recommend Peter Peacock well I think that there's some things that could be advanced particularly in the community ownership section because the community empowerment bill is already going to deal with amendments to the land reform act and our view would be that the government should get on as quickly as they can and consult on that and try and use that vehicle to maximum effect now what exactly maximum effect is we just have to you know have to tease that out a bit but I can see a number of things that the government given the timescales of that bill could impact on through that bill but that's really around the community ownership stuff in particular on the other stuff there's clearly other things that require to be considered and worked on and there are probably different timescales attached to them and there's some I think recommendations about things going to the law commission for example but I think the important thing is that this doesn't get into the long grass and that we keep it as a very clear political I'm using political with a small p content but a political matter that requires to be dealt with for all the reasons the review group set out this is about change for the for the common good and therefore we can't allow it to disappear off the agenda my own hope is that the minister will over the next week or so set out hopefully how the government want themselves to handle it and then we can all respond accordingly thanks very much that's very useful I find myself in the position of always coming back to the diagrams on page 176 of the report that's the one about prices of different types of land and the one below it which is even more important price of land compared to other commodities which you could find shows that the best thing to invest in in the last 10 years was gold the next best thing was Scottish and English farmland the next best thing after that was Futsi 100 and finally you've got UK house prices at the bottom if Scottish and English farmland are the second highest return levels there clearly is something that suggests that this land reform review is urgent because it cannot be related to the economic value of that land and so that's why the question about the sale of land and the use of land are interrelated and I say these things you know making bold statements but you know I cannot see any other outcome when you look at that diagram as to whether or not these things should be taken separately or not whether Scottish land and estate say it's all about how land is used no it's not because clearly land is a huge value and therefore we have to have a balance in all these things and I hope that it's going to be possible for us most certainly to make sure that the minister gets us a clear timetable as early as possible and you will indeed have a great opportunity to contribute to that next stage I'd like to thank you all warmly for the way in which you have made sure that we have the points of view here for the committee to mull over and I hope that we get our chance to get the official report at an early stage this week because there's a lot in it it's been a long meeting thank you very much for your attendance so just before we close let me say that the next meeting is on the 11th of June we'll be starting at 9.30 the committee will take evidence from the minister on land reform review groups final report and we'll be interviewing the UK fisheries minister George Eustace on marine and fisheries issues with that I close this meeting