The Scottish Government’s Land Reform Bill is gambling with the future of communities in rural Scotland and investment in the transition to net zero.

That’s according to a 46-page submission by rural business organisation Scottish Land & Estates (SLE) to the draft legislation, following a call for evidence by the Scottish Parliament’s Net Zero, Energy and Transport Committee.

Among its criticisms, SLE stated that the proposal to interfere with the sale of large landholdings by giving ministers power to split the landholding into lots jeopardises a range of projects supported by government, including housing provision, renewable energy, commercial forestry and carbon sequestration schemes.

It also argues that measures in the Bill to break up large estates rely too heavily on conjecture based on impressions rather than evidence, while evidence that land management at scale has positive outcomes for the environment and communities has been sidelined.

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