Next steps for land reform

2. A land system working in the public interest

2.1 Why land matters

We all need and use land. It is a common resource, central to our sense of place and identity, our economy and to people’s everyday needs and opportunities. Ownership and use of land shapes everything from housing and infrastructure to natural resource use, food, nature and climate action. The ways it is owned and used, land tenure, rights and responsibilities, shape who can influence and who can benefit from land. 

Reforms can open opportunities for more people and can ensure our land system keeps pace with changing public needs and expectations.

2.2 What changes do people want to see?

In our ScotLand Futures engagement we asked two simple, open questions:

1. What changes would you like to see in how land is owned and used in Scotland and what difference would that make to you, your community or your work?
2. When you think about land in your area, what’s most important to you?

We heard from over 1200 people across Scotland and analysis shows the consistency in emerging themes is striking.¹ 

• A strong appetite for action – more than nine in ten respondents (96%) said there needs to further changes in how land is owned and used.
• Concern about concentration of power – around a quarter of respondents highlighted that too much land, and too much influence, sits in too few hands.
• A lack of transparency – one in twenty people flagged difficulties knowing who owns land and see this as undermining trust and accountability.
• Connection to place matters – one in five people said landowners should be meaningfully connected to the places their decisions affect.
• Too little local influence – more than one in ten respondents said they feel unable to influence land use decisions in their area, particularly where change is significant and long-term.
• Frustration with wasted potential – derelict and underused land, and the limited use of tax to encourage productive use, were seen as signs that existing tools are not being used to their full effect. 

The ScotLand Futures public engagement provides strong qualitative insight into changes people would like to see. The Commission is using this in combination with the body of research and evidence we have published over the last eight years to distil a direction of travel for the next phase of reforms.

2.3 Our wider evidence and experience

Since establishment in 2017, the Scottish Land Commission has led fresh thinking and research to shape reforms in law and policy as well as changes in practice. Acknowledging that issues of land ownership and use are not unique to Scotland, our research has frequently looked internationally to learn from what others around the world do, as well as looking at previous experience in Scotland and the UK. 

Our research and recommendations cover issues relevant to both urban and rural Scotland that include land ownership, land markets, tax and fiscal policy, natural capital, vacant and derelict land and housing land supply.² 

But we don’t just rely on our own work, there are leading researchers and academics examining these issues, as well as a range of think tanks, consultants, communities, businesses, organisations and interest groups all addressing similar questions. Our work draws on the best information available, wherever it comes from.

2.4 Meeting Scotland’s ambitions – what could success look like?

A reformed land system would open opportunities and carry public confidence. • People would be confident that our land system is fair, fit for our time and works in the public interest;

• Individuals looking to own or use land would be confident there are viable opportunities to own, lease or use land through a range of tenure options;
• Communities would be confident that where they want to own land, it is a realistic option; and that they have a meaningful way to shape and benefit from significant land decisions affecting their place;
• People who own land would be confident in investing, making decisions and in making opportunities available through letting, joint ventures and other routes.
• People would be confident that information about land ownership, use and value is readily available and that where the power of land ownership is misused, it can be held to account effectively. 

We heard through ScotLand Futures many voices across sectors, interests and geography that want reforms to create this kind of confidence in our land system.

Land reform involves changes in rights, responsibilities, and the balance of power so will always involve debate and challenge. Whatever your perspective, there is benefit in clarity of direction that provides greater certainty. But certainty cannot be reached without resolving some of the longstanding underlying issues in our land system. 

Core to this is the power associated with land ownership and the concentration of this power in relatively few hands. A land reform programme should address this from both ends. It should create many more opportunities for people to own and use land. That is why we propose a focus on creating new land opportunities for individuals as well as communities. But that power will remain present and influential, which is why we also propose safeguards against the misuse of power, particularly where there is risk of localised monopoly. 

We see the following as being key conditions for success in a land reform programme:

• Use existing powers to the full – Use the full range of existing powers, conditionality and fiscal levers in a co-ordinated programme of reform.
• Resource and invest – Resource and invest in key interventions and the underpinning capacity that enables people to take up opportunities.
• Devolve decisions – Strengthen the powers and resource for regional and local decision making that empowers local democracy.
• Public sector leadership – Use the role of public landowners and public bodies to lead, facilitate and deliver change.
• Targeted law reforms – Introduce targeted law reforms where new powers or regulatory functions are needed.

2.5 The public interest – a golden thread

The ‘public interest’ is the thread that should connect a range of reform measures. The phrase encompasses the ambitions that an elected government seeks to achieve on behalf of citizens. 

‘Behind the concept is the idea that the elected government should serve the people and that in a modern society there exists a general interest in the fair and efficient use of resources, and in such values as transparency, fairness and accountability.’³ 

The public interest evolves over time and is not defined in primary legislation. This approach allows flexibility and ensures considerations are kept up to date. For land reform, this helps avoid one-size-fits-all answers and respects the individual circumstances of landholdings or communities. 

However, sometimes parliament sets some clear public interest expectations. In the recent Land Reform Act 4 for example, parliament has agreed that guidance on the ‘public interest’ to inform Lotting Decisions must take account of the desirability of:

• achieving a more diverse ownership of land, including more community ownership of land.
• furthering sustainable development.
• securing a greater proportion of community owned energy.
• advancing community wealth building.
• ensuring an adequate supply of affordable housing and of workspace for employment. 

These factors give an insight into the outcomes parliament is seeking to deliver through one specific land reform mechanism. More widely the public interest should be the connecting thread between a range of different policy interventions used. 

The public interest is also important in being the only legal justification for Government to override private property rights. Property rights are protected through the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR), enshrined in Scots law. Broader economic, social and cultural rights don’t currently have that same legal standing but are expected to be incorporated into Scots law through the government’s stated intention for a Human Rights Act. This new Act would strengthen the status of the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (ICESCR) with associated duties for public bodies.

The ICESCR already underpins Scotland’s Land Rights and Responsibilities Statement, the first principle of which states: 

‘The overall framework of land rights, responsibilities and public policies should promote, fulfil and respect relevant human rights in relation to land, contribute to public interest and wellbeing, and balance public and private interests. The framework should support sustainable economic development, protect and enhance the environment, support a just transition to net zero, help achieve social justice and build a fairer society for the common good’. 

There will always rightly be a high bar for a government to override property rights. While a new Act will help clarify how and when government can meet that test in the public interest, existing legislation shows how action can be taken legitimately and effectively already. 

Beyond new legislation, there are of course public policy levers which do not directly affect property rights that can be effective and practical means to deliver reforms, for example using the power of public land ownership or reforming tax and fiscal policy.

2.6 International context

There is much international interest in Scotland’s modern land reform journey, which arises from Scotland’s unusual position compared to many other countries. Land ownership in Scotland is abnormally concentrated by international standards, a product of our history and legal framework. Significant areas of land are owned by relatively few people and organisations, and land reform takes place in a modern developed democracy with strong institutions and property rights. 

Historically, Scotland is unusual in that the periods of reform and revolution seen across many countries in previous centuries, which led to a much wider basis of land ownership with greater individual access to land, did not occur in the same way in Scotland, if at all. 

Enlightenment and Napoleonic era land reforms in other European countries, as well as 20th century redistributive reforms following two World Wars and decolonisation, created waves of land reform activity globally.⁵ While every nation took its own approach, government action on the redistribution of land is particularly notable in India, Japan, South Korea, Nepal, Mexico, and Ireland.

However, recent international evidence shows that land inequality is worsening in most countries, often as a result of the financialisation of land investments and agriculture, alongside weak regulation.6 The modern trend of increasing concentration in ownership may not be unique to Scotland, but we start from an already highly concentrated pattern of ownership. 

The Scottish Land Commission has regularly published research on international experience to inform Scotland’s land reform programme.7 This examines topics including natural resource governance; municipal, communal and community ownership; land value taxation; interventions in land markets; governance and ownership structures; and housing land development. 

One of the clearest differences with many other European countries is that the issues Scotland now seeks to address nationally through land reform are often matters that are dealt with as a matter of course by municipal government, a highly empowered level of local government that Scotland had until it’s abolition 50 years ago. 

There is no blueprint that can simply be lifted from elsewhere, but we can learn a lot from international experience. Not least that this experience shows successful land reform requires bold leadership, effective intervention, and adequate resource from a state which is not afraid of challenging the status quo where necessary.

¹ Scottish Land Commission (2025) ScotLand Futures: What We Heard 

² Scottish Land Commission (2024) Summary of Research and Recommendations.

³ Mure, J. (2022) Balancing rights and interests in Scottish land reform, Scottish Land Commission 

⁴ Land Reform (Scotland) Act 2025

⁵ Sugden, F. (2025) Scottish land reform in international Context, Presentation to the International Symposium on Land Reform, James Hutton Institute

⁶ MacInnes, M. (2025) Scotland in global land reform context: An overview of key themes, Presentation to the International Symposium on Land Reform, James Hutton Institute 

⁷ See for examples: Scottish Land Commission (2026) International Experience