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Scottish 'land reform' is just shameless legalised theft
Duke of Buccleuch
Daily Telegraph, 20th March 2003
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Some of your more generous readers might try to equate me with Hector in the
television serial Monarch of the Glen. We do indeed have something in common
with Glenbogle; all estates, on anything but good arable land, share in the
struggle for economic survival. A popular misconception is that all acres are
pure gold - that lots of acres automatically mean lots of wealth. Sadly, it
takes 6,000 acres of our hill and bog to equal 100 acres of good arable land or
a 10-acre suburban paddock.
Now that there is a suspicion that land reformers are less concerned about the
countryside's welfare than wealth distribution, as they see it, we must be a
prime target, sitting on more acres than anyone. To them, all acres are worth
the same. We should start from a premise with which everyone would surely agree,
the ideal situation whereby there is perfect harmony between all the competing
interests that make demands on the countryside: a thriving and happy community
of people; sustainable food production; sustainable timber production; nature
conservation; good landscaping; public amenity and recreation; and sport. The
achievement of this ideal has been due to the traditional family estate that
embodies enlightened land management, planning 100 years and more ahead, with
consistent policies that transcend individual farm boundaries.
In the course of naval duty 50 years ago, I asked the communist Tito of
Yugoslavia how his agrarian reforms were progressing. His interpreter hissed
that I should change the subject, because they had failed and they were handing
the land back to the owners. To his credit, Tito was quicker than most communist
leaders to accept that the communal system of farming just did not work.
Today in Scotland, we are being ruled by a majority of Central Belt politicians
who appear never to have stepped off a pavement into the countryside. Making a
publicly funded paradise out of the islands of Eigg or Gigha, or the Knoydart
peninsula, clearly appeals to caravan immigrants from middle England; but can
these communities really be self-sustaining over a long period? The taxpayer or
lottery player might reasonably expect a 10 to 20-year trial period before
extending this generosity to other parts of Scotland. As for proposals for
community buy-outs and the expectation of river fishings in crofting areas, even
Tito might have blushed at such shameless legalised theft.
Those who want to give tenant farmers the right to buy their farms - at half the
vacant possession market price - apparently believe that they are freeing
forelock-tugging serfs from the captivity of oppressive landowners. They may be
surprised to learn that most tenant farmers actually choose to be tenants,
rather than owner-occupiers, for very good reasons. Every one of the farm
tenants on Buccleuch Estates became a tenant of his own free will, 42 percent by
inheritance and 58 percent by application. Of the latter, 23 percent gave up
being owner-occupiers to become estate tenants and a further 28 percent were
farm workers with little hope of becoming farmers in any other way. All of them
enjoy complete freedom of action, and share in the management and marketing
benefits of a partnership/cooperative system.
Farms require constant reinvestment in fixed equipment - houses, steadings,
roads, bridges, water supplies, drainage systems, stone walls and fencing. Rents
from hill and stock-rearing farms barely cover this. The mere threat of a 'right
to buy' could halt reinvestment and future farm letting.
Estate ownership is as serious a business as chains of newspapers, garages,
shops or pubs. Our enterprise involves more than a 1000 people producing each
year: 127,000 sheep; 13,500 head of cattle; 18 million litres of milk; 20,000
tons of cereals; and 50,000 tons of timber. At the same time, we are managing
430 square miles of beautifully landscaped and publicly accessible countryside,
attending to the well-being of people and wildlife on it, opening four
properties to 100,000 members of the public, looking after 1,200 houses, of
which a quarter are listed buildings, keeping up more than 5,000 miles of
fencing and many miles of hard roads and tracks, as well as the shared
responsibility for two dozen churches and four historic houses. It is a National
Trust-type of operation, without the tax advantage that the Trust enjoys.
The Buccleuch Estates have earned the reputation of being one of the most
progressive and enlightened estates anywhere. To keep and enhance such a
reputation requires hands-on management by members of my family, supported by a
team of experienced professionals. It is because many generations of the same
family have been devoted stewards of the countryside that this reputation has
been won and kept. The time scale exceeds the credibility of the average town
dweller; the oak trees planted today will take 200 years to mature and hopefully
the new lead roof on Drumlanrig Castle will last until 2200.
The change in the pattern of land ownership has been dramatic in the past 80
years. Owner-occupation increased from 20 percent to 70 percent of all farm
holdings, while much of the remainder consists of large tracts of hills whose
viability is marginal or negative. It is the ownership of these areas that so
excites the acre-maniacs. This explains the claim that 50 percent of Scotland is
owned by only 350 people or institutions. Ninety-five percent of Buccleuch
Estates has the European Union (EU) classification of 'severely disadvantaged'
while countless urban and suburban properties have the same value as a
fair-sized Highland estate. I wonder how property owners in Edinburgh might
react if their tenants were given the right to buy at half-price?
It is not always recognised that the beauty of our landscapes owes so much to
the integration of farming and forestry by estates in a way that would have been
impossible to achieve with single-farm ownership. The cohesion of estates has
been a power for good for all who live on them and their local communities.
Picking holes in them threatens their complete break-up. Why not heed the
lessons of President Tito?
© Copyright 2003, Daily Telegraph
www.dailytelegraph.co.uk
Duke of Buccleuch
The title of Duke of Buccleuch was created in the
Peerage of Scotland on 20th
April 1663 for James Crofts, eldest illegitimate son of Charles II of England,
who had married Anne Scott, Countess of Buccleuch. In 1666, Anne was created
Duchess in her own right, so that the title was not affected by Monmouth's
attainder in 1685. It passed on to his descendants, who have borne the surnames
Scott or Montagu-Douglas-Scott. In 1810, the Duke of Buccleuch inherited the
title of Duke of Queensberry, also in the
Peerage of Scotland, thus separating
that title from the Marquess of Queensberry. Thus, the holder is one of the only
four people to hold two or more different dukedoms, the others beings the Duke
of Hamilton and Brandon, the Duke of Argyll and the Duke of Richmond, Lennox and
Gordon.
The subsidiary titles associated with the Dukedom of Buccleuch are: Earl of
Buccleuch (1619); Earl of Doncaster (1663); Earl of Dalkeith (1663); Lord Scott
of Buccleuch (1606); Lord Scott of Whitechester and Eskdale (1619); and Baron
Scott of Tyndale (1663). (All, except for the Earldom of Doncaster and the
Barony of Scott of Tynedale, are in the Peerage of Scotland.) The courtesy title
used by the Duke's eldest son and heir is Earl of Dalkeith.
Source: Wikipedia, the free encyclopaedia
Duke of Buccleuch
Buccleuch Estates visit: http://www.buccleuch.com
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