The right to buy land to further sustainable development: consultation analysis

Compensation And Grants Towards Liabilities To Pay Compensation

Question 20

Do you agree with the Scottish Government’s proposals, as outlined above, for regulations to govern compensation payments for activities relating to Part 5?

• There were 16 responses to this question, with 14 responses agreeing to the proposals. One person disagreed and one person partially agreed to the proposals.
• One individual respondent objected to taxpayers’ money being used to fund the community to acquire somebody else’s property.
• An organisation said there was merit in ensuring consistency in approach with the claims process relevant for claiming compensation under Part 3A of the 2003 Act.
• The Scottish Churches Committee said that, to deal with the event that a community body may not have a registered address, provision should be made for a compensation request to be submitted to the community body’s registered office or other known correspondence address.
• In addition they said they were not clear about the circumstances which might entitle a community body to refuse a compensation request, as section 67 (of the 2016 Act) says that the applicant is entitled to recover the loss or expense which they have incurred.

Scottish Government Response

The Scottish Government has considered the responses and will draft regulations to govern compensation payments which are in line with those for existing community right to buy regulations.

Question 21

Do you agree with the Scottish Government’s proposals, as outlined above, for regulations to govern grants towards compensation payments for activities relating to Part 5?

• There were 14 responses to this question, with 13 respondents agreeing with the proposals and 1 person disagreeing.
• Scottish Land and Estates said that it should be expressly set out that there needs to be parity between the level of detail sought to justify a compensation claim and the detail provided in return in determining the relative success or otherwise of a claim.

Scottish Government Response

The Scottish Government has considered the responses and will draft regulations to govern compensation grants to be in line with those for existing community right to buy regulations.

Question 22

Are you content that the draft grant application form is fit and suitable for purpose?

• There were 14 responses to this question. Twelve responses agreed with the proposals, 1 disagreed and 1 partially agreed.
• One individual commented that the question asking the community body to provide details of all reasonable steps they have taken to obtain money in order to pay the compensation, seems ambiguous as to how much effort should be made to raise alternative funds and from what sources.
• They suggested the grant fund administrators provide further guidance on this, and asked if the community body is expected to seek, possibly fairly exhaustively, other grant funding options before approaching the grant fund.

Scottish Government Response

The Scottish Government has considered these responses and is content to draft a grant form in line with that for Part 3A.