Community owners want a say

SCOTLAND'S growing community ownership sector will press the Scottish Government for greater recognition at a meeting next month.

Community landowners will meet Roseanna Cunningham, the environment minister, who is responsible for land reform, on 9 February.

It follows a conference in September, when delegates felt community ownership was no longer considered a priority by the SNP government. Ms Cunningham will be presented with the results of a study examining how best to establish an umbrella support organisation for community landowners.

The study is also looking at potential funding to run the organisation for three years, areas where community land initiatives are under-represented and potential partners for community organisations.

Community bodies also want to reinstate the Scottish Land Fund, funded by taxation and not Lottery money.

Hundreds of thousands of acres are now in community ownership, with local trusts aiming to tackle depopulation and remoteness by building homes, businesses and small-scale renewable energy projects.

The call for a new body has been supported by Professor Jim Hunter, a former chairman of Highlands and Islands Enterprise. He said the extent of community ownership was striking, not least in the Outer Hebrides, where more than two-thirds of the population now lived on land owned by the community.