Wild Land News no 54, Winter 2001/2002

Community Purchase Of Gigha Article

At the end of October, the residents of Gigha secured the purchase of their island at a price of £4,000,250. Jubilation, however, has been tempered by serious financial concerns which hold implications for the Executive's wider land reform programme.

Almost all of the money for the purchase came from public sources. Highland and Islands Enterprise contributed £500,000, and a massive £3.5m came from the £10m. lottery-based Scottish Land Fund.

As part of the deal, the islanders are committed to paying back £1m. over two years and a fund-raising campaign is now under way. About £40,000 was understood to have been pledged by Christmas, and local fund-raising events are raising a few hundred pounds at a time, but £1m in two years is a tall order for a rural population of just over 100. As one of the trustees commented "For a while we were the centre of national press attention, but they have gone and the flow of financial support has dwindled away."

Despite refinements to the Community Right to Buy section of the Land Reform bill, the Executive seems barely to have acknowledged the central problem of small communities having to match open market prices which, in the case of Highland estates are often inflated by speculative purchasers or those seeking the romance of a private kingdom.

The Land Reform Policy Group's 1998 consultation document "Identifying the Solutions" noted that a "fall in market value" would be one of the consequences of implementing land-value taxation, yet the Executive has failed to recognise the necessary connection between land reform and wider macro-economic policy. That connection urgently needs to be made if stability in the land market is ever to be achieved.

The Land Reform Policy Group forecast that the Community Right to Buy would "effect a rapid change in the pattern of ownership". At the moment that seems somewhat over-optimistic.

The Isle of Gigha Heritage Trust can be contacted at www.gigha.org.uk.