Land Reform: Proposals for Legislation

2 Register of Community Interest

2.1 The proposed legislation will give properly constituted community bodies the means of registering their interest in the land where they live and/or work. Once their interest is registered, the land cannot be sold without their interest being taken into account.

Eligible areas

2.2 The proposed legislation will apply throughout rural Scotland. Rural Scotland can be defined in either of 2 ways: either on a population density basis or by excluding built-up areas. The map illustrates in general terms the areas that will be covered on either basis. This approach to coverage means that it will be up to rural communities themselves to decide whether they want to use this new legislation. A more restrictive geographical coverage would mean that only some communities could benefit.

Eligible properties

2.3 Any land in which a community body has registered a prior interest will be covered. The advantage of this approach is that it will focus action only on those properties in which there is community interest. Any alternative mechanism (for example, setting a size threshold) would inevitably include large numbers of properties of little or no community interest, and would be more bureaucratic and more costly.

2.4 The Government believes in the principle that all landowners in Scotland should be treated equally under the proposed new legislation. There will therefore be no general exemption for Crown bodies. Public sector landowners will be covered by the proposed legislation, just as private and non-Governmental landowners will be.

Registration

2.5 A community body will be able to apply to Scottish Ministers to register a community interest in the land where its members live and/or work. (If technical difficulties can be overcome, communities will also be able in exceptional cases to register an interest in land nearby if they can demonstrate its importance to underpinning sustainable local development.) A standard application form will be provided to minimise difficulty. The relevant Scottish Minister will have to be satisfied that this community body is a proper body to register a community interest in that land. This will be settled by reference to criteria to determine:

• Whether the land is eligible (ie on the map defining rural Scotland);
• Whether the community body is properly constituted and has the sustainable development of that community as its primary object;
• Whether most of its members live and/or work on the land in question;
• Whether it is representative of and supported by the local community.

2.6 Once the Scottish Minister is satisfied on these aspects, he/she will include the community body's interest in the land on a register of community interest. There will be a procedure to allow bodies to de-register at will; and, to ensure that the community body's interest has not changed, there will be a light-touch re-registration process every 5 years. The register will be updated regularly, and will be available for consultation at Government offices and on the Internet.

Eligible community bodies

2.7 To be eligible, a body must be constituted as a community trust, and should be incorporated in some way. The normal model would be a company limited by guarantee. Model constitutions will be made available. The key criteria are as follows:

• The community body must have the promotion of the interests of the local community as its primary object;
• The community body must be constituted so as to guarantee its financial probity, and to ensure benefits do not flow to members as individuals.

2.8 To ensure that it is the local community that benefits from these new rights rather than other stakeholders, the core membership should be those individuals aged 18 or over who live and/or work on the land in question. Other interested parties eg the local authority, public bodies such as Highlands and Islands Enterprise, Scottish Natural Heritage, non-Governmental organisations such as the John Muir Trust and neighbours can also be corporate or individual members but should not have a controlling interest in the community body. Community members must constitute a voting majority.

Appeals

2.9 At this stage it will suffice if there is evidence that the bid to register an interest has been endorsed by at least 10% of those aged 18 or over who live and/or work on the land in question.

2.10 Landowners will be able to appeal for judicial review of the Minister's decisions to include their land on the register of community interest. Similarly, community bodies will be able to appeal against exclusions.

Rural Scotland defined by Postcode Unit and Land Cover of Scotland Urban Areas

Unit postcodes which overlapped with the Land Cover of urban areas were selected to create urban areas. The remaining land has been classified as rural areas.

Scottish Office Geographic Information Service 15 Jun 99 Job: aw501