Community right to buy - Scottish Charitable Incorporated Organisation: model template and guidance

Model template and guidance to enable a community to form a Scottish Charitable Incorporated Organisation (SCIO).


This model Scottish Charitable Incorporated Organisation template has been created to enable a community to form a Scottish Charitable Incorporated Organisation, for the purposes of registering an interest in land and exercising the right to buy land under Part 2 and Part 3A of the Land Reform (Scotland) Act 2003 and Part 5 of the Land Reform (Scotland) Act 2016.

A community is defined geographically under the Acts and must consist of one or more of the following prescribed types of area:

  • postcode unit(s)
  • postcode sector(s)
  • postcode district(s)
  • electoral ward(s)
  • community council area(s)
  • island(s)
  • settlement(s)
  • locality or localities

The model template can also be used by communities looking to form a Scottish Charitable Incorporated Organisation for the purposes of submitting an application to the Scottish Land Fund.

On completion of the model template form, a community body must send its Constitution to the crtb@gov.scot mailbox. A review of the governing document will then be undertaken and this process may take up to four to six weeks to complete.

Once the Scottish Government has completed its review, and the community body has applied any requested amendments to its Constitution, the community body must then send its provisionally approved Constitution to the Office of the Scottish Charity Regulator (OSCR).

On receiving confirmation from the OSCR that the community body has been entered onto the Scottish Charity Register, the Constitution must then be returned to the crtb@gov.scot mailbox.  A compliance letter will then be issued to the community body.

If your body is an existing community body (already entered on the Scottish Charity Register) then a compliance letter can be issued to the community body prior to the Constitution being approved by the OSCR. This step applies only where no amendments have been made to the Purposes of the community body.

For the avoidance of doubt a community body cannot submit an application for any Right to Buy unless and until its Constitution has been approved by both Scottish Ministers and the OSCR.

SCIO guidance.pdf

Contact

Email: crtb@gov.scot

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