Farming bill

THE last time agricultural legislation was amended in 2003, it was preceded by debate over several years between landowners and tenants’ organisations. Agreement was reached, only for the bill to be hijacked in our parliament, and all sorts of other matters added that ignored the hard won consensus.

Another bill is on the cards, consultation finished with no real contention, so the campaign of misinformation to hijack it for more far-reaching reform has started. For Andrew Arbuckle and Angus McCall to contend that the landlord/tenant system in agriculture is unique to Scotland (29 August) is utterly ludicrous.

Where Scotland is perhaps unique is in its parochial and blinkered view of the outside world and its simplistic fixation on land resettlement 150 years ago, which happened the world over and was here as much connected with potential starvation as rapacious landlords.

For the record, Germany, France, Belgium and Luxembourg all have significantly lower rates of agricultural owner occupation than the UK, and Sweden has about the same.

A 1998 Position Paper to the Food & Agriculture Organisation of the UN, “On Private Sector Tenancy Arrangements: Europe”, looks at the advantages, disadvantages and different purposes of agricultural tenancies throughout Europe. It states that “it is important to recognise that most European countries acknowledge a number of advantages to having a farm tenure system in which ownership and occupation are separated”.

Its conclusion recommended the Scottish Limited Partnership (effectively made unworkable after the 2003 hijack) as one of two (then) existing models of best practice.

Hector Maclean

Kirriemuir

Angus