Why Scotland needs a land tax to take on rich landowners who claim public subsidies and pay little tax

Four hundred committed campaigners, community representatives, tenant farmers, crofters and concerned citizens were discussing the urgent need for land reform, while 421 landowners own and control more than half of rural Scotland. For me, that thought crystallised everything that’s wrong with our land system.

Scotland’s potential is being strangled by an unjust system that concentrates power in vanishingly few hands. Communities can't develop their futures. Land-based businesses can't grow. Housing remains constrained. And yet we're told, again and again, that we must be patient. That change takes time. That the latest of many, land reform Bills is "progress”.

READ MORE: What is changing on land ownership? How has rural Scotland responded?

Far greater ambition needed

In her closing statement before the Bill was passed, Cabinet Secretary Mairi Gougeon’s words were revealing. Acknowledging “we have more work to do”, she called the new legislation "an ambitious step forward on our land reform journey”.

I'll give her credit for the honesty; at least she's not pretending this law will solve the problem. She has essentially fired the starting gun on the next phase of land reform, and handed us the mandate to push further, harder, faster.

So that's exactly what we're going to do. The manifesto launched by the Revive Coalition on Saturday, if enacted, would represent the most ambitious land reform legislation Scotland has ever seen. We are proposing these policies not because we're radicals or dreamers, but because we have actually listened to what people want.

READ MORE: How John Swinney let slip that this is as good as it gets for Scotland under SNP

No niche rural matter

Last year we commissioned the Diffley Partnership to conduct the largest independent study of Scottish attitudes to land reform ever undertaken. More than 2,000 people were surveyed, there were nearly 1,400 consultation responses, plus focus groups, stakeholder roundtables, the full works.

The Scottish public told us that they see land reform not as some niche rural issue, but as central to just about everything – housing, jobs, climate, nature, and democracy itself.

One focus group participant expressed concerns about the “invisible power” of landowners, while another said they wanted land taxed "to the point where you can't have large land holdings”. These are ordinary Scots who've figured out that our land system is fundamentally broken.

The reason why I get frustrated is because politicians keep trying to incentivise large landowners to do the right thing. They throw public money at them and hope they'll suddenly develop a social conscience. It's not working. It has never worked.

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Necessary discomfort?

The next parliament needs to change the script entirely. Stop incentivising and start requiring. Landowners should be obligated to act in the public interest, full stop. Not as a nice-to-have. Not as something we reward them for doing, but as a baseline condition of ownership.

A robust public interest test should apply to existing landholdings and any large land transfer. Can you demonstrate you're contributing to community empowerment? How are you advancing climate and nature targets? How much affordable housing do you provide?

I know this makes some people uncomfortable. Perhaps it should. There is a stark imbalance of power that needs to be addressed. Scotland has been far too comfortable with a system that serves 421 people while millions struggle.

Right now, Scotland’s land is the perfect asset for the wealthy. Buy it, sit on it, watch its value soar, pay minimal tax, claim public subsidies, sell for a profit. Repeat. Meanwhile, communities and cooperatives who actually want to do something productive with land can't afford to compete.

Land tax is non-negotiable

This is why a Land Tax Bill for Scotland is non-negotiable. Tax large landholdings at a rate that makes speculation unattractive but leaves genuine, productive use viable. It’s a win-win. Generate revenue for the local area and bring land prices within reach of people who'll actually use it for public benefit.

Our manifesto also calls for a cap on how much land any single person, family, or company can own, and a recommendation to limit large land purchases to Scottish and UK taxpayers so that no more offshore accounts can control our country. And by creating a publicly accessible map showing exactly who owns what and how they're using it, the Scottish Government could end hidden landownership once and for all.

There’s a disappointing pattern becoming evident in Scotland’s slow land reform journey. Bills get watered down, amendments get rejected, and we're told to be grateful for crumbs. Then everyone acts surprised when the next review shows the concentration of land ownership has got worse, not better.

A political choice that must change

Not this time. This time the starting gun has been fired by the Cabinet Secretary who has acknowledged “we have more work to do”. We have the evidence of what Scotland wants. We have a growing movement that spans political parties, communities, and sectors. And we have an election coming in May next year.

Political parties face a choice. They can adopt policies that can halt the increasing concentration of land ownership by the few, or they can explain to voters why 421 people owning half our land is somehow acceptable.

The next parliament must both obligate landowners to act in the public interest and disincentivise the ownership of huge swathes of Scotland. The concentration of landownership isn't inevitable, it's a political choice, and political choices can be changed.

Max Wiszniewski is the campaign manager of the Revive Coalition