Engaging communities in decisions relating to land - guidance: review

Background

4. Part 4 of the 2016 Act created a duty for Scottish Ministers to issue Guidance on engaging communities in decisions relating to land which may affect them. The Guidance, which supports Principle 6 of the Scottish Land Rights and Responsibilities Statement (LRRS)^[3], and the statutory requirement to promote the LRRS, was first published in April 2018.

5. There is a duty on Scottish Ministers to lay a periodical report before the Scottish Parliament assessing the effectiveness of the Guidance and any steps to improve it, with the first such report due in April 2021. This report will fulfil Scottish Ministers legal duty.

6. The Scottish Government provided the Commission and members of the Commission's Good Practice Advisory Group^[4] the opportunity to respond to a set of questions about the Guidance, including on awareness of the Guidance, its effectiveness and how it might be improved. We received three responses from the Group: from the Commission, Scottish Land and Estates (SLE), and the National Farmers Union Scotland (NFUS). The responses from SLE and NFUS drew on their work and their members' experiences, and the Commission's response drew on research sources and their work.

7. The Scottish Government also commissioned a substantial piece of research into attitudes to land reform in Scotland, including on attitudes to the diversification of ownership, vacant and derelict land, community engagement, and access rights. This research was carried out by Ipsos MORI, who conducted a literature review, expert interviews, a mixed-mode telephone and online survey, workshops and further in-depth interviews. Eight stakeholders who have professional experience and understanding of public attitudes to land reform took part in the expert interviews, and 1501 respondents aged 16 and over participated in the survey. Quotas and targeted sampling were used to ensure that the final survey sample was representative of the Scottish population for gender, age group, working status and Scottish Parliament region. Forty-seven respondents selected from the telephone survey, divided into nine groups, participated in the workshops and a further twelve took part in in-depth telephone interviews. The final report has now been published^[5].

8. Key findings of the report include: a low level of understanding of land reform, and of the Scottish Government's land reform agenda; and that the public are interested in, and more supportive of, land reform after learning more about it.

9. The Scottish Government has drawn on the findings from both the Commission and the members of the Good Practice Advisory Group, as well as the Ipsos MORI report in order to assess both the effectiveness of the Guidance and any steps to improve it.