t we always put forward for for the crofting system is is that if you drive through certain parts of Scotland where there isn't crofting there is no one there and when you drive through crofting communities there are lots of people there but the point is that a lot of these these crofters don't own the land the majority of crofters still don't own their land but they have protection and that's that's what's absolutely crucial about this that the people that are using the land need to be protected I mean something sorry to go into what may come up in another section but something that was very significant and it's mentioned in the report was when the common agricultural policy started to become a very lucrative way of earning money if you own land then tenants started to get pushed off the larger estates and this is a form of clearance that's happening now and I think that's something that's very much at the heart of this is about the control and the use of that land and who gets rewarded and multiple amalgamation I'm sorry but I don't agree with you over that the farmers selling to farmers is about amalgamation and these land masses get bigger and bigger and more and more public money goes into fewer and fewer pockets and that's wrong okay that's a strong point of view Angus McCall Peter Peacock Willie McGee and we're going to move on after that I've fed Jim to some points to wrap it up yeah so Angus McCall thank you convener first of all I quite agree with Patrick that there needs to be control over land purchase I mean I think we must be the only country in Europe that doesn't exert some sort of control over who buys land in Scotland and I think the accumulation of vast acreages is not very helpful to rural society I think in many ways I agree with what Nigel was saying that it's not necessarily how the land who owns the land but it's how it's used I think in instances of very large estates I think we need to have some mechanism of looking to see how these estates are being managed and to see whether they are actually being managed in the best public interest are agricultural opportunities being used as much as they could be used is the land being used to its full potential are local communities able to do what they need to do and in many cases you find that there are areas where there is an estate monopoly are not necessarily managed to their best advantage and I certainly have a lot of concern about the increasing disconnect between the owners of the land and the people who rent the land or who work on the land and the group in the middle who are actually managing the land the land agents I think in many cases are not looking far too much at the bottom line rather than the profit line rather than what is in the best interest of local communities we have lots of examples of land on large estates which is not being used to its best ability I think that a lot of it is being driven by CAP, CAP reform but there is far too much land that is being used more as a sump for drawing in subsidy rather than how it could be most used from a productive point of view Peter Beacock A few quick points if I can it is this question of use and ownership that both Sarah Jane and Nigel raised to some extent I think one of the good things really good things that the report draws out is to debate that issue in the report and say actually you can't address the land question in Scotland just by land use because it is a prior step and that is ownership and ownership largely determines the land use in fact they quote the Hurton Institute I think in a quote about them referring to the predilections of land owners largely determining what the use is so I think it's important to recognise that and we support the land reform review group in drawing that point out I guess my last point is the point that Sarah Jane was making about what's wrong with this proposal and it's dead easy I think to pick up all sorts of technical things about how difficult this might be on the other hand if it's not this proposal well which proposal is it because a challenge to those who oppose any intervention well they've got to say is there not a public interest question that society can ever ask and to me that's the key thing you know are we simply saying that there are simply no circumstances ever in Scotland that we're prepared to ask the question is this land managed in the public interest I don't think that's a credible position but there's all sorts of way no doubt of answering that and that's what we need to get into I think Willie McGee To echoes Peter's point we don't have enough diversity in land ownership to see the number of different models of land use we've got this flush of community ownership which we're on current evidence assured is producing more housing more activity we're not quite sure where that's going but I think the point is that this opportunity given by this report and the kind of cut the zeitgeist if you like in Scotland at the moment is a real opportunity to explore new ways of managing land and I agree with Peter that land use and land management it's very difficult to separate them out I have a question just very quickly convener we're moving on to another section after this and we're moving on to agricultural holdings we're coming to that after taxation after taxation we're right okay then I have nothing more to say Jim Hume and I'll ask him the question on taxation in a second but just to sum up it thankfully Andy was the only person who actually was brave enough to state an actual figure and it was about 190,000 acres that was I think about 77,000 hectares but nobody really touched the part of should this be retrospective or it should just be new accusations it's very unlikely that somebody's going to be coming to buy 190,000 acres but there are some I suppose we will have already got 190,000 acres but not that many less than a handful I would have thought so but and Peter Pickup mentioned other European countries and I believe some of the Scandinavian ones or at least one it's only about 700 hectares which is below the average size of a Scottish farm so obviously there's quite a difference in variety there so we're going to have a whole week probability to discuss it and I realise we'll have to get on but I just thought it was worth summing up with on that point Can we leave that on the table because it was certainly us but thanks for making it I like the focus and just Can I just make one point very briefly to Peter the word diversity has been mentioned and I don't think we should lose track of that because as I tried to draw out last week probably very unsuccessfully we have some fantastic examples of where larger states work for the public benefit we have examples of where they don't work for the public benefit one of the things that really bothers me about aspects of this is how you centrally determine what the public benefit is but I think why I appreciate there's an argument about the diversity of land ownership I would argue that we have an enormous diversity of land ownership in this country I think that is a good thing there are good land owners there are bad land owners there are good tenant farmers and there are bad tenant farmers there are good owner occupiers and there are bad owner occupiers it is all that is all part of the rich diversity that makes Scotland the extraordinary country that it is and I the one comment I would make is that if you take this recommend I mean if you take this recommend if you believe that limiting the size of land that anybody can own is going to stop there being good examples and bad examples of land management and public benefit then I think you're going to be hugely disappointed I'm just to end up this section I would suggest that since we've heard from Patrick Krausa you know that we have a regulated market in crofting it's always struck me that in the larger land owner world that we don't have a regulated land market for land ownership as a whole but anyway Jim Hume land taxation payments and markets yes everybody loves taxation of course but the group mentioned that the group mentioned that they thought the current fiscal regime needed to be looked at to encourage an increase in the number of land owners obviously there's I presume they mean smaller land owners one concern there obviously is how that affects the the tenancy market and obviously tenancy market is very important for new entrants there's very very few new entrants that could actually start off as being a land owner so we have to think of the future I presume some of the recommendations they mentioned was ending the exemption of agriculture, forestry and other land based units from non-domestic rates I appreciate the government has rolled this out but we must remember that we're scrutinising the group's report here they also mentioned land value taxation species specific sporting rates to mention a few therefore it would be interesting to hear from the panel what their views on the impacts and proposed changes would have on rural land use yes thank you I mean I think this is a very important part of the of the report and it highlights a number of issues that have never really been properly subject to much democratic scrutiny I mean a very interesting comment was made by a witness from the Institute of Fiscal Studies to the Scottish Affairs Committee when it was looking at this question which was that if you have generic reliefs for example they don't they're not targeted the cost of those generic reliefs is never properly totted up as the recent national audit office report on tax reliefs pointed out the original purpose for granting those reliefs is lost in time and the reliefs themselves get capitalised into land values which then obviously quite understandably get defended by those who currently enjoy the reliefs because it would lead to a drop in land values so we're in a difficult place with some of these things but I do think it needs a very critical examination I would just say on the non-domestic rates point of view there is no longer any rationale for exempting any non-domestic property from rates in my view the original intention the original reason why this was done in the 20s and earlier in England in the 1890s was because agriculture was having a bit of a tricky time so they got some relief and then that relief just became built in until it was completely abolished in the 1950s and it seems to me very unfair from the point of view equity that you know hairdressers and cafes and bus stops and garages and all the rest of it in a small town are paying what are fairly substantial rates of 47 pence in the pound notwithstanding the small business relief scheme and yet large areas of land around big farms commercial forests are paying nothing towards local taxation and the interesting thing about this recommendation as well is if you introduced non-domestic rates to those properties that are currently exempt of course you'd have to do it in a phased way you couldn't just you know do it overnight you'd have to do it in a phased way and possibly quite a long phased way but the key thing is there for most pairs of non-domestic rates if you're to have a finite pot a finite yield from non-domestic rates you could cut their bills and that seems to me of enormous attraction to rural businesses and urban businesses and it's not just the exemptions it's also large exemptions that exist for example for industrial unused property the building that went on fire a few years ago in Glasgow cost an awful lot of money to put the fire out the courts had to adjudicate on insurance claims and all the rest but paying no rates had it been paying rates it had been paying about 750,000 pounds to Glasgow City Council and yet the owner of that property in the middle of Glasgow expects the fire and the police and the court system and indeed this parliament and people to operate society to protect their interests and yet it's paying no contribution so I think it's a very very important point and I think essentially what the report is arguing is that we review these things it's not making a clear recommendation on any one but we review whether they're still justifiable thank you sorry, Willie, Maggie, Nigel, Miller, Patrick, Croust Sarah, Jane, Lang, Peter, people deep breath yes the first policy group we again we welcome the recommendations made in this section and specifically in relation to paragraph 20 in sporting rates as it stands we have a red deer population in Scotland which is something like three times that it was at the end of the Second World War the carrying capacity of the land has been far exceeded we believe that there is not only huge habitat and ecological damage but there's also a large cost that's being borne by taxpayers and that comes in the form of fencing tree protection stalking so people who are harvesting wild deer are essentially allowing others to pick up the tab for their sport and we believe that sporting rates would be one way we also believe in licensing because slightly to one side I think that in order to get a grip on issues such as wildlife crime that sport should be licensed but the rates would allow local authorities and depending on how they were they were collected the public interest if you use Peter's phrase to reclaim some of the costs that are currently being paid for deer damage thank you Nigel Miller thanks very much this is obviously a key area and I obviously recognise this as reserved in many ways but I think it's something that should be addressed by the committee in reality your tax and release will actually drive behaviours and therefore I think this committee has a big role in actually looking about how best practice and opportunity can be driven by your tax regime and my own view is that those that operate to best practice should benefit from reliefs those that actually fail to deliver wider benefits should not and I think that that's a very political question the reality is that these I guess measures have been targeting your estates and larger farms they would obviously ripple down on to all family farms and if we look at land tax and issues at that level on an annual basis and I appreciate the government's already intervened on business rates if we look at projected figures from HSBC they're not our figures margins on spring barley and it's a pretty crucial crop in Scotland and for the whisky industry 26 pounds per hectare projected this year at 165 per tonne and we're into a negative margin if we go to 130 years a tonne if we look at projections for whole farm projections for upland stock farmers with maybe significant cattle hards on in the big sheep flocks the net profit predicted after support 14,000 hill beef sheep units which on higher land looking this year at a lost situation the reality is if you actually push taxes on to these farms their viability and their continuity will be in question so before you look at tax, look at the impacts look at the impacts on food, jobs, communities they will be significant if you look at APR you know this is something which is meant to fragment land use we've seen it used or we can understand that fairness would suggest that there shouldn't be a protection of you know herdswell land in reality without that we're going to fragmented holdings which probably will not be viable in the future and real problems in getting our next generation into land these are pretty crucial issues not just for farming but for the country side we have and for our food industry so you're looking at at two levels this is a really powerful incentive we can use it's also quite dangerous but it's targeted wrongly thank you Patrick Croser and then Dave Thompson I would like to first say that in our submission to the group we said that we agreed with the idea of a land value tax so just to confirm that point what I actually want to draw attention to is that under the section land use payments in the background there's some good context about the common agricultural policy and under point 36 the group says well they point out that there's an increase in concentration to the ownership of farms in Scotland particularly on the better agricultural land and that the group also considers that the value for money in terms of public benefits from public funds for aspects of the cap agricultural subsidy schemes should be much clearer than the case at present and this didn't really get transferred into the recommendation that they make at the end of this which is recommendation 43 so I just want to highlight this because I think you know this is at the heart of a lot of discussion that has been going on about common agricultural policy reform and so obviously it has its place there but it has its place in in this wider aspect of of reforming land use in Scotland because what people what people sort of quite commonly unfortunately commonly people aren't equating CAP with public funding I mean common agricultural policy money is public funds and so this point about having a measure of how well that public fund is used for for public interest is really important to the whole thing and at the moment the common agricultural policy very much leans on providing more money to those that already have rather than it being directed towards public good thank you Dave Thompson I'm very reasonably brief about this please and yeah thank you convener I mean obviously the whole issue of taxation is a very important one it's a very complex one as well and the Scottish Government has ruled out you know moving towards taking away the exemption from non-domestic rates the Scottish Affairs Committee I think have done a very good investigation so far in relation to these issues but they've said they've got more work to do and I would wonder in front whether we shouldn't be asking them to have a very close look at all of those tax issues which are reserved issues and we can maybe look at the ones that are devolved and we can maybe work with them to come to some sort of clear way forward eventually I mean looking at things like land value tax and so on you've got so many taxes and I think the thing with taxes is that if you're going to work a tax system properly you need to be able to adjust and increase some and reduce others to get the sort of balance that you need there's a lot of work here to be done I would welcome you know working with the Scottish Affairs Committee on this of course we might not need them after the 18th of September but there you are so that's really the the main issue that you know I would like to just put forward what what do people think about a twin-track approach if you like between ourselves and the Scottish Affairs Committee on this Last two more we're going to speak on this one Sarah Jane and Peter Peacock unless there's something Jim wants to come back on no doubt Just to agree with what Patrick and both Nigel said you know tax reliefs and any payments are there to deliver public goods and if the tax regime that we have isn't delivering those public goods then there's nothing to be feared by looking at it I think what has to be what has to be behind this is a driver to ensure that APR, BPR everything else that we have is delivering public policy that's why they were put in place and not driven by an underlying dislike of the people who actually receive those reliefs and you referred to a lack of democratic review of the non-domestic rates recently the Scottish Government has just actually reviewed that and it was a full consultation and published its findings of that so I'm not quite sure why Andy feels there was a lack of democracy within that process but again if we're going to look at non-domestic rates let's look at it there wasn't a sort of economic impact assessment I couldn't tell you how much land would be classified as sporting under the sporting rates I'm not sure that appears anywhere in there let's have a look at that let's see what the extent of that is what the public money is and what the impact on any businesses would be and again for agriculture let's map it let's understand what the economic impact of any change would actually be Land mapping suggests itself to me but Henry Peter Pico Yeah I was going to just pick this up as a point of principle I mean it seems to me that it would be a very odd report about land reform in the comprehensive way that this report is if it didn't mention taxation because as Nigel Miller says taxation and changes in taxation drive behaviours and that's what this is about to be driving behaviours so it has to raise the question I mean I guess the political landscape is littered with the bodies of politicians who made the wrong decision about the taxation so I can see why I can see why this is difficult for people but in principle you've got to be prepared to open these questions up if he want to bring about greater diversity of land ownership now whether it's non-domestic rates or sporting rates or inheritance tax or capital gains tax or land value tax I don't know I mean there's a huge debate to be had about that the important thing is that the debate goes forward and perhaps Dave Thompson's got a you know a point whoever is responsible for taxation these matters have to be looked at in respect of how we achieve our objectives for land a few points here and again we could do another with another week on this on this one I was quite concerned when the review group it came back to us last week that they hadn't considered the impact of some of these changes on agriculture and of course you know that's the major rural land use it's also brought up a bit of an anomaly I mean Andy Wightman said you know farms don't pay any local tax at all but of course there's quite a lot of council tax has come from areas and I've just come back to two or three questions before there's a bit of an anomaly that you know the farmhouse if you like especially a tenanted one a tenant in the farmhouse doesn't have any rights regarding their housing perhaps as it's seen as a commercial property the farmhouse is seen as a commercial property but they pay local income tax and council tax usually quite large council taxes as well because there's generally bigish houses so a bit of an anomaly there also so yeah complex indeed okay we move on to agricultural land holdings Dave Thompson's going to lead thank you convener a couple of things here one relation to crofting the report recommending you know reducing the complexity of crofting legislation I know there have been calls to consolidate the legislation but that's a wee bit different to actually reducing the complexity so I would welcome some views on how we would go about that it is a massively complex area at the moment the other issue about selling off government crofting estates at less than market value what folks views are on that and the need for improvement three of the 2003 arc so that's the sort of crofting issues I would like to get some views on and then on tenant farming issues where should the agricultural holdings review group be going there are certain recommendations in here should we be picking up on that and making some recommendations to them in relation to the suggested conditional right to buy and also removing the requirement to register interest so that it's automatic I mean does that really go far enough what are people's views on that but let's take the crofting bit and then okay that's absolutely right right Patrick Croser on the crofting bit Peter Pico on reducing the complexity of crofting law well no it's probably actually it's probably actually quite quick I think there's a tweet from Jim Hunter quoted in the report that says scrap the legislation start again and with a clean sheet I think he says because every successive amendment makes it ever more complicated and my view on this I'm it's probably fair to say that this is my view and my recommendation I make in our organisation rather than it being our organisation's view is that were we to start a system of crofting now I say ask the question would we design a system of legislation that we have and the answer clearly is no of course we wouldn't so the logic there is start with a clean sheet and I know there are um well the the 2010 as amended as amended or is it 93 as amended as amended as amended as amended is being looked at and there's a sump collecting the anomalies in in in the law it started off with a view being given that this isn't about amending the current legislation it's about trying to work out where there's tweaks and that I think having having participated in the collection of the sump I think they realise now that the sump is so big and full of of very serious flaws in the law that that I think we would be recommending that that we start again and I know it's it's constantly said Parliament will not want to touch crofting again it has to touch crofting again because because the 2010 made things worse rather than better on the selling of crofting estates it's an interesting one because this is one that the group came back to us asking why don't crofters use the the 98 act to buy estates that are owned by the ministers and to an extent it's because tenants on these estates have a very good landlord and and they have the protection of crofting law therefore why why change things whether you could sell estates under the market value this is a huge discussion that I don't know the answer to because because the the ogre of state aid rules is always wheeled out at some point when there are discussions about this and it seems to be really difficult to get definitive answers about state aid and and what about these these protests next week although I don't you know you know and on part three there are there are particular points I think I think the um the report covers them all actually there are main ones being things things like this complexity of mapping that's asked for under part three that in no other sphere is this complexity of mapping ever asked for registers of Scotland don't have maps like like they ask crofters to produce it's a it's a complete nonsense a point that didn't come up in the report that we made in our submission was that the um the organisations involved in both part two and three need to um have a structure um as we said and the report says that there needs to be different constitutions looked at but an important thing no matter what the corporate structure is is is that these organisations need to be democratic as we said in our submission in the the third sector third sector organisations have to have a rollover of directors for example and for some reason community bodies I think missed out on this so just looking at how to implement this would be good righto thank you Peter Peacock calm McLeod without going over the same ground just three three points very quickly if you could simplify clofting law absolutely but hopefully you can pass it to the next generation and I don't have to write any evidence papers on it because it's very very very difficult but it's an objective we certainly should indeed indeed on the crofting estate's point about should there be should it be possible to do that at lesser market value or at nil value absolutely yes and in fact the Scottish public finance manual does permit that technically but the incentives for the person that has to make the decision are disincentives they're not incentives and I think and in fact I know the Scottish Government are trying to look at how they interpret that and how they make it work but in principle absolutely it should be possible I would I do want to stress this so that I don't think there's any way that we should be seeking to force crofter crofting communities to take estate it's absolutely got to be up to them if they want to do it and that has to be there clearly expressed well then every facility to help them should be given but we can't force people to do that we're strongly of the view that no community crofting or otherwise should be encouraged against their will to be around this road they've got to want to do it part three of the act absolutely necessary to simplify that the mapping requirements that Patrick referred to are completely tortuous there's no particular reason for them to be there they wouldn't be required in any other facet of our transactions over land so absolutely simplify it but the ultimate power of part three is vitally important about the actual right to buy because that is what is giving rise to the negotiations that are now taking place particularly in the western Isles for the transfer of significant areas of land into community hands that's being negotiated but the power of the act lies in the background to help facilitate that To simplifying crofting law last time I was here I had the imminent crofting law at Derek Flynn by my side and he's not here now so I'm going to skip that particular question but in relation to the transfer of crofting estates the only one organisation that's actually done that West Harass Trust I think they found it possibly akin to something out of a Kafka novel basically they had problems in relation to or challenges in relation to the ballot there are all sorts of issues around aspects of swilling public money from one organisation to another doesn't seem sensible at all so if that can be done at below market value I think there's a very strong public interest motivation to do that and estates are certainly listening if that would be relevant in relation to that in relation to part 3 of the land reform act as the only example of where we've seen that thus far I mean if West Harass Trust had somebody out of a Kafka novel this is taking it off the scale frankly big issues around mapping but there's also one other issue which I think is important too in the general kind of sphere of what we're talking about here in terms of land reform that's around human rights because there's a challenge obviously in relation to the human rights issue with regard to the legitimacy of the park attempted by it and that was found not to be in contravention of that and I think that's a very strong message in terms of broader human rights issues beyond that of the individual which are obviously very important too but I think there are implications in terms of broader issues around land reform in terms of that Sarah-Jane Lang in terms of the crofting landlords as Patrick knows Dr Jim Balfour who chairs our crofting group I always bow I have to say to her greater knowledge when it comes to crofting being a lowlander she tells me I'll never understand it but I have to say crofting landlords are completely on side with this about the need to simplify and make sure that what we have is fit for purpose I think if you're going to look at specifics the paragraph 34 relates to this ridiculous situation you have just now someone makes a minor error in omission their application is thrown out we firmly believe that that should be rectified without delay it's caused a number of willing seller willing buyer things to fall at the first hurdle and the cost to the organised that the people involved has been horrendous as Patrick said so I think that's something that we can do straight away I think park is something that we can all look at and take real lessons of how not to do things I think everyone is quite clear and that also includes the transparency and speed of decision making by Scottish ministers I think it's one of the things that that's shone a light on and if we're going forward to land reform I think that that has to be addressed in any element whether it's part three or whether it's an extension of rights under part two thank you and finally the two people for this section before we move on to agricultural holdings is such Angus Macaul and Wally McGee thank you just a small point about the anomalous position of small landholders who fall between the two stools of ag holdings and crofting law that they haven't had any changes to the legislation since 1931 until the crofting acts in 2007 to 2010 that these crofting acts tried croffin reform acts tried to make a pathway for small landholders to convert to crofting status because as I'm sure you'll appreciate the most small landholders missed out on being designated croffs because they're in the wrong area and the Duke of Hamilton made a very good job of making sure that the island of Arran didn't get crofting status so what has emerged from the crofting reform act is a totally unworkable piece of legislation where the process of trying to convert to crofts particularly if you have an unwilling landlord is almost impossible and the two crofters who've tried it the two small landholders who've tried it have really had to give up and try another route we recommended to the the land reform review group that these small landholders should be allowed to rather than go down the crofting route should be able to have the ability to purchase their small landholdings directly and in fact that was a recommendation made on the island by Sir Crispin Agnew when he came over with us to talk to small landholders I'm glad to see that the review group has recommended a statutory right to buy for crofters which I think for small landholders which I think is only the sensible thing to do they have also recommended that it be on the same basis as a crofting purchase i.e. 15 times the annual rent which is far more sensible than the convoluted process a present of trying to ascertain the value between small landholding status and crofting status and then they have to convert to crofts and then they have to apply to buy the land so I commend that recommendation from the review group to you thank you very much Wally McGee and Patrick Krauser to end the crofting bit of this question very quickly it's about tenant farms section 28 forest policy group we believe there's an omission there and that's in respect of the tenant farmers right to woodlands and trees on a tenant farm we're undertaking a piece of work at the moment to look at the willingness or otherwise of tenant farmers to put more trees manage more woodlands on tenant farms where the situation to be otherwise Nigel mentioned something that's on going just now so we'll be taking that up with NFU and with the tenant farms association okay thank you Patrick Krauser that's the very last thing I just wanted to bring up the identification of the parties involved in land buyouts within crofting law a crofting community is defined as one thing and then under the land reform a crofting community is defined as something else and I think this needs to be sorted out and then also under part three a crofting community can't then make an application to buy under or register an interest in buying under part two so just a really strange anomaly that that same community has to redefine itself and set up a whole new community trust so that needs to be sorted out and then the last thing was about identifying land owners as well I think there's a problem with this Andy mentioned some companies owning land and how difficult it is sometimes to track down who that company actually is and there was an example also in Shetland of some land being sold in auction and being resold and resold so rapidly that it was never being registered and the crofters there have no idea who their landlord is so that needs to be sorted out too Thank you very much Dave's question to the agricultural sector you know the land reform view group have made some recommendations the agricultural holdings review group you know will be in a position probably that they should listen to that so I guess both Nigel Miller and Angus McCall want to sort of lead on this one just now so we start off with Angus and then Nigel Thank you convener from from our perspective I think the land reform review group have made some very common sense suggestions that they haven't gone into any detail and of course you wouldn't expect them to go into detail but I think that what they are broadly suggesting I think chimes exactly with our thinking and I think we would fully support it what we would hope is that the land reform review group have said about ag holdings will be taken will be seen as the context in which that they should be reform carried forward by the ag holdings review group I think that there are two separate reviews one's an independent the other one is a ministerial led one but I certainly hope that the the ag holdings review group under the cabinet secretary would pay particular attention to the recommendations of the land reform group the one that our first recommendation was the to do away with the need for registration of interest to buy land and I for the life of me I cannot understand why it was ever brought in in the first place the area of land is usually fairly fairly well defined and the requirement to register is just is superfluous to our way of thinking the registration of interest does not guarantee the accuracy of the registration so what can in effect happen is that a landlord can put the farm on the market and then challenge the the tenants registration so it's no guarantee to the tenant that his preemptive right is going to go ahead it also there are about 1300 registrations on the on the register of Scotland about nine are there only about 900 or 950 of those which are still live some of those will have dropped off because of the the requirement to to reregister after five years some of them will have dropped off because of challenges but they there are many more to I mean the majority of tenants given the offer of a preemptive right to buy the farm would take it up but a lot of them have not signalled their interest really because of the effect it has on the relationship with the landlord and I think that certainly that the need to to register an interest is shouldn't be there and I welcome that suggestion regarding all the all the other the other comments that the land reform group made I think a bit like crofting we're really looking at maybe starting again with a with a clean sheet we do have an agricultural legislation which is incredibly complicated it's nearly as complex as crofting and it suffered from from years and years of amendments and if you try and look up a legal point you need about six fingers to put in six different books to cross reference I think that what we're needing is some form of perpetual tenancy for the 91 secure sector I think they have indicated that sort of direction of travel with talk about assignation and so forth I think we need to have more flexible models for renting land to allow new entrants in and I think we also need to have some some conditional right to buy inserted not necessarily for the whole farm but the ability to to purchase house and steadings or bits that are needed for diversification enterprise enterprise and so forth I don't want to curtail debate because obviously it's important to hear each of the sectors perhaps Nigel wants to respond to this just now first of all I think we're fairly close to Angus to be honest we support the preemptive right being automatic and we support that these recommendations go to the ag holdings group and we think you know that's a you know that process is to us working well so okay that's good thank you Arlyn Leidlaw I haven't heard from you for at least an hour I think that's not your fault I was being brief as requested convener I think Angus' point about the flexibility and the sort of functionality of the legislation is key because the last thing anyone wants and the you know the area they got greatest concern last week was a charter for lawyers and you know whether it be crofting or ag holdings it gets very complicated very quickly and I think we need to make sure that all legislation in this area is fit for purpose for everybody involved because what is actually happening is there's a sort of delay in being able to get things done that both parties want and I think that flexibility and that pragmatic sort of fit for purpose legislation would be a huge benefit to the sector and to the relationships I'm a firm believer that landlord and tenant must work in partnership to deliver the most that they possibly can from the interest and I think at times where we're at the moment there's quite a difficult dynamic can develop because of the legislative process I think in terms of the right to buy and that's everything I think that's a matter for the review group to take forward further but I think we just need to be realistic about not the point that Patrick makes not everyone wants to buy their asset not everyone wants to take the financial commitment of purchase you know and various other reasons and I think we need to make sure that there isn't one prescription for everybody you know there's some fairly robust sort of views from others that that's not the the only holy grail we've got Alec Ferguson and Sarah Jane Lange I just want to make a very brief point to put on the record really convener that I'm slightly disappointed that the review group looked at this issue just as I'm slightly disappointed it made recommendations on deer management and wild fisheries because these are all areas where there is considerable work going on at the moment with specific groups of expertise to look at these issues and I think it would have been a more helpful position if the land I can understand that they wanted to mention it but I think it would have been more helpful and more conducive to a positive outcome if the review group had simply said recognised that there is a lot of work going on in these areas and left it to those specialist organisations to report I don't expect that to be a wildly popular position around this table but I wanted to put it on the record but who knows Sarah Jane Lange I don't want again to technical specifics as others have said we're feeding those into the eye callings review and I'm sure we'll be back back again very soon to discuss the interim report and the final report from that group but just a one thing that struck us from this section was reading through it I was unclear what the group was trying to deliver is it perpetual tendencies is it churning the sector is it turning tenants into owner occupiers and then reading back why would they want to turn tenants into owner occupiers if they're saying that the tenant farming community is the one that tends to score high in the social measures that it was trying to achieve so I think it's maybe reflective of other parts of it the vision that they're trying to achieve or the picture they're trying to achieve isn't clear so you do seem to have contradictions within this section in terms of eye callings convener thank you very much Dave I think we've exhausted that at this stage very good I'd just like to sum up on timescales and interrelated recommendations we have heard a lot of ideas about whether land ownership is the key determinant of how land is used and there's been strong evidence on that we're looking for realistic timescales for implementation of the reviews ideas there are recommendations obviously need to be made about which parts relate to each other and what cumulative effects the implementation of the land reform review group recommendations would be because we have to think about the future and how it all pans out so there's a process issue here and I wonder if anyone has final thoughts you know very very briefly about how you think we should take this forward I would just suggest that we need several work streams and that perhaps you might want to concentrate on that approach when we then question the minister in a very interim sort of way okay so Sarah Jane lying and then Peter Peacock convener I would agree you can't tackle this in its entirety at one stage I think as well as looking at work streams I would suggest a sort of matrix approach to things that we know we can do now things that we you know are sort of medium term and things that are going to take a long time to really think through and I think work streams but that sort of short medium and the long term approaches is something that we would recommend Peter Peacock well I think that there's some things that could be advanced particularly in the community ownership section because the community empowerment bill is already going to deal with amendments to the land reform act and our view would be that the government should get on as quickly as they can and consult on that and try and use that vehicle to maximum effect now what exactly maximum effect is we just have to you know have to tease that out a bit but I can see a number of things that the government given the timescales of that bill could impact on through that bill but that's really around the community ownership stuff in particular on the other stuff there's clearly other things that require to be considered and worked on and there are probably different timescales attached to them and there's some I think recommendations about things going to the law commission for example but I think the important thing is that this doesn't get into the long grass and that we keep it as a very clear political I'm using political with a small p content but a political matter that requires to be dealt with for all the reasons the review group set out this is about change for the for the common good and therefore we can't allow it to disappear off the agenda my own hope is that the minister will over the next week or so set out hopefully how the government want themselves to handle it and then we can all respond accordingly thanks very much that's very useful I find myself in the position of always coming back to the diagrams on page 176 of the report that's the one about prices of different types of land and the one below it which is even more important price of land compared to other commodities which you could find shows that the best thing to invest in in the last 10 years was gold the next best thing was Scottish and English farmland the next best thing after that was Futsi 100 and finally you've got UK house prices at the bottom if Scottish and English farmland are the second highest return levels there clearly is something that suggests that this land reform review is urgent because it cannot be related to the economic value of that land and so that's why the question about the sale of land and the use of land are interrelated and I say these things you know making bold statements but you know I cannot see any other outcome when you look at that diagram as to whether or not these things should be taken separately or not whether Scottish land and estate say it's all about how land is used no it's not because clearly land is a huge value and therefore we have to have a balance in all these things and I hope that it's going to be possible for us most certainly to make sure that the minister gets us a clear timetable as early as possible and you will indeed have a great opportunity to contribute to that next stage I'd like to thank you all warmly for the way in which you have made sure that we have the points of view here for the committee to mull over and I hope that we get our chance to get the official report at an early stage this week because there's a lot in it it's been a long meeting thank you very much for your attendance so just before we close let me say that the next meeting is on the 11th of June we'll be starting at 9.30 the committee will take evidence from the minister on land reform review groups final report and we'll be interviewing the UK fisheries minister George Eustace on marine and fisheries issues with that I close this meeting


Okay everyone, give me your best shot out there. I'll cook and have fun. That's my toad. You're welcome. I've never heard such a good toad before. Okay. Do you want to hear like my actual toad? I don't know if Discord's gonna mute it, but I'll try. Nice, nice, nice. Hey, I'm toad!  I made it to the end of this once and then didn't realize you had to get back and then I was like, oh No way.   There you go, Ashley.   That's half. Ashley would love them if they were cold and old. I can't afford the star, so I might as well get an item now, right? I mean, yeah, sure, go for it. Dude, can I just say like I'd rather not move this round. Can I just stand my ground and vibe? You know what? I've reserved myself to letting Chris have this star. I'll just move on. Yeah, yeah, call me poor toad. Do it. Parasocial plummet? I love PNGs. Dude, I love PNGs. Ashley, if you had to think about the word PNG, like what is it? Do you know what it stands for? Post-nasial. Please don't. I was trying to distract you. Please think about this.  Here it is. This is the weird chomp thing. One would have suffice. It's a little weird. Post-nasal gooch. Oh, damn, that was like right next to where I was. You couldn't even tell me what PNG was, man. Huh. Yes! It works! What's going on? Let's go, baby. We had a channel point prediction if I would get a star first or not, so everyone's freaking out. All the doubters are pissed as they should be.  Yo, that eyeball texture is stretched to top. There's a lot of channel points going into these predictions, guys. What's your prediction right now?  I kind of want to join. So mine is if I'll win or not. That's an easy amount of money to win right there. I have a 20-minute timer on it. 282 versus 198,000. 20-minute timer? That's a lot. Could be a lot of channel points in this. One of my mods. 180,000 points. Fuck!    That was so shitty. Come on.  My hair. I did last time. Why are you eating like this? I don't know. Yeah, you and me, Chris, we got this. Yeah, we're hungry. Oh wait. Oh, I didn't realize. I thought it was one-to-one kind of thing. I didn't know! Warping across the whole... Let's roll. Let's roll, literally. Nice. Yeah, pretty funny. It's pretty actually incredibly big base humor Big base humor. I just look like I have a really bad rash now. I'm sorry, what? With my body paint, my pink body paint. I just look like I have a really bad rash. I mean, possibly, yeah, maybe. You know what? I'm sorry.  I got two whistles. I had two whistles. I've used both of them now. See where it took us. Whoa, and still we're flying off.  It would have been right up where I was. I hate everything. Yeah. You're a good guy. That one guy at the party. You're a good guy. You're a good guy.  And don't even let anyone ever tell you you're not. And then you're always just sitting there nodding your head being like, Thanks, man. Thanks. I appreciate it. Just like trying to get out of the conversation. But he just keeps going back. He's like, Hey, no. Don't downplay it. You're great. Be proud of yourself, bro. Be proud. Bro, so I'm going to start an app. Can I guess who wakes up first between Mika and Ethan? Sure. Mika. No. You didn't even let Chris answer. Oh, sorry. Yeah, Chris, you're right. But you know why? Why?  Kind of. I mean, like I do wake up early. I just like check my phone and then go back to sleep. I don't know if I would call that waking up though. No, because I'm awake and I'm like on my phone for 20, 30 minutes. And then you go back to sleep though. But that doesn't mean that you've woken up. You could technically call it waking up and then taking an app immediately. You could have. I guess so. You could have, but you chose to chill. Except. You could wake up for a half an hour and then go back to sleep as a superpower. But I think you're trying to win on a technicality of, yeah, I woke up at 6 a.m., but then I immediately went back to sleep. I do technically wake up first, but Ethan is the one that like wakes up, gets out of bed and starts his day. See, again, I think you're trying to just win off of a technicality. I'm not trying to win. I just said that you're the one that... I'm about to... go over there and teach you a lesson. Get up first. But yes, Chris, most of the time it's either I have to pee. It's mostly a poop thing, actually.  Now that is something for her. He never heard of it. Four to five times a day. Oh, four to five times a day. Now that is a... It's a medical condition. But... So I'll wake up either to poop or start work things and stuff.  That's insane to me. That's insane that somebody can only poop once. One time, Chris? In a day? One and done? That is normal. No, no, no, no, no. What? Once a day, I think is... Maybe twice if it's like... if we're feeling a little spicy. I think twice should be the minimum. You're dropping... I'm dropping mad loads. But wait. Well, not every poop is a walk in the park. So what's the over-under here on this? On what? On pooping? I don't know, man. I think you have the gold medal for who poops the most. Ever? I don't think so. Wait, the maximum for me is 2-3 times a week? That's not enough.   Pooping? Oh, I'm so sorry. There we go. Pooping 2-3 times a week is too little. It's way too little. Yes, IBS King. Ethan, someone... Wait, hold on. Jordan, one of my mods in chat said please call your enteralogist if you don't have... I don't have a normal doctor. I have not been to the doctor in like four years. No, that's not true. Stop spreading that lie because that is not true, Mika. I've lived in LA for six years. You can't be telling people that I haven't been to the doctor once since moving here because that's not true. How many times have I been to the doctor? Yeah, yeah. To get a physical. To get a physical? To figure out what your butt is doing. I mean butt things we haven't explored. Oh, I don't do that. Oh!   I pooped too much. Give me a star. Wait, okay. I don't want Mika spreading slander.  But at one point Mika was saying to our friends she's like Ethan poop six times a day. No! No! That doesn't happen.  I did not say that I pooped six times a day. Maybe you like it. This might be TMI, but if you sit too long in the toilet you can get the old hemorrhoids. The old hemmies. Which I've never gotten hemorrhoids, which is crazy to me. Hell yeah, I've got two colonoscopies over here. What's up? Oh, nice. I didn't know that, man. Yeah, and I was awake for both. Hey. Thank you for your service. Two tours.  Everyone in my chat is doing the little salute, the 07. Yeah. I just get emails from OnlyFans. I got an email from OnlyFans today. No, they're... Sorry. I love how my voice cracked. No, I get emails from OnlyFans like every two weeks of people or of people. No, of the company being like you should join OnlyFans. Guys, this is a really rough conversation. You're sweating over there. Y'all, I'm sorry to like really break up this German talk, but Max just sent me a picture of Mario with his dick out and I just think that's a really bad one. Oh, tell him to send it to me. Give Max my number. I haven't sent it yet. I'll set that as his contact image. Max just texted me the picture with just the picture and then a smiley face. So good. God, Mika, your name popped up right next to my mom's.  I was expecting fan art, but... No, it's kind of cute, right? Ethan, we're going to win this one by the way. Sorry, I wasn't paying attention. Do we have to work together or... We had to just have like the same vibe. We got this. It's all right. Don't worry about it. Nice. Get him out. Come on, Chris. Come on, Chris. We got it. Come on, baby! Come on! No! We got time.  Come on, baby. Let's go, baby. No, it's the revolution. Give us your coins. Show me your coins, baby. It's socialist balls, bro. Wait! Oh, shoot! No, no, no. He spreads them out evenly. Oh, I was going to... It's socialism. Comrade Bowser. The only thing that I take solace in is knowing that the coins bonus star is not about how many coins you have at the end. It's how many you've collected total. Oh, my God.  I don't have a single star. But you are a star, so that's fine. Oh, Chris. Watch this. Watch this. Oh, my God. There's no way. I'm a three-star handy over here. Christopher Melburger. Christopher Melburger. Christopher Melburger. It's the smallest of my last names. Come on, baby. Has anyone ever heard you, Topher? Yeah, my mom, and that was it. My mom would be like, hey, Topher, how cute is that?  Think about this. You'll get it next round. Chris, would you ever consider going by Topher? Never. It kind of sounds like you're offering Topher something. Like Topher Melburger? Yeah, five gifted for you to change your name to Topher Melburger. Is there a grace here? You know what? You're right, man. This sucks, dude, because Mika's going to get the star. And I hate everything. Right behind me. We're going to need to roll a two here so he can get the star. So...  Never mind. Come on.  I think I can still do it if I triple dice it, so let's try. No! No way! My god!  So, Meeks, you're going to want to use that whistle for sure. No, Mika, please. Mika. Yeah, yeah. And I'm going to give Ethan the first block to maybe make it interesting. Chris, I have no stars. I know, but you might be able to steal some. Make it interesting. I have nothing. That's not true, dude. Two dogs! This is just... Give me two. The warp! If you get on Ashley, you get to get a star. Come on, God. I don't believe in you, but maybe right now I could. Fuck!   I haven't even seen this one before. Come on! You guys both have 120 stars. You can just do all 120 and go for it. Do you want to go for 120? Nothing would be pretty spicy. Whoever wins is almost guaranteed like the most coins, extra stars. So like... There's about to be a 240 banger here. He just pressed start, bud. I don't need practice. It's okay. Anyways, that's fine. Oh, Mika's fucking...  Let's go, Mies. This is for 120 coins. No, it's for 240 coins. End extreme. There we go. Stars right here. Yeah, last turn. Oh, man. This is so depressing. No, it's not. You're really having a good time. Two to one of your rats. Two to one of your rats. Yeah, I just got a new boy rat. I named him Tuna. Thank you for the credit, babe. I appreciate it. They have wicked balls, man. Yeah, they do. They really do. Chan had seven rats at one point.  I hate everything. So many people are going to lose channel points, guys. Think about the channel points. Good. I need to roll a six. Who manifests a six, guys? One. One. Five. Five. Five.  Man, I'm so sad after this. I let down my chat. I let down myself. Everyone's going to lose their channel points. And I'm going to lose my... Wait, are you going to get a star?  No! Nice. So you made it to the Bowser space. So you made it to the Bowser space. So you made it to the Bowser space. So you made it to the Bowser space. Yeah! No. Ethan, get that star. You need it. He can't. He has no coins. Oh, that's so sad. No. You don't have any coins, huh? Fuck. Everyone.  I didn't even... Even the bank is like, oh, I'm sorry. We were going to have any coins.  This game sucks, dude. We don't have enough coins.  Jesus Christ. In shape. Toadette sucks, man.  Oh! Oh, sick! What are you saying? Go buy a star with that, man.  Roll a seven, roll a seven, roll a seven. Roll a seven, roll a seven.  Roll a seven.  Ashley, you can work to me and then take it. Don't do this. Yeah, why would you say that? How far away am I? It's four. Give her a two.    I mean, what's the point, you know? What's the point of this mini-game? I don't care. Don't get crushed.  He thinks I'm having a good time. Alright, Chris.  Come behind me.     Get him! Come on! Go for it. I've never been more angry in my life. Shopping bonus. Who bought things? Couldn't beat me at the end of the game with my zero coins. I'll get this five. Nice star, man. Second bonus. Slip hook bonus. Maybe me?     Who got the biggest balls? Stupid. Predictable. Who could have seen this coming? Maybe that's how it is. Oh, fucking... I mean, fine. Fine. Alright, everyone has to do the same thing last round and pose.