News In Focus
6 November 2007
Review of land reform laws promised
The Cabinet Secretary for Rural Affairs and the Environment has promised a review of the land reform legislation, which will look at how the Act has worked since it was passed in 2003.
Richard Lochhead was speaking after meeting Ramblers Association Scotland director Dave Morris and the association's president, former MSP Dennis Canavan.
At Stirling Sheriff Court yesterday a further hearing took place in the case between Euan and Claire Snowie, who want 40 acres of their Stirlingshire estate exempted from the Act, and Stirling Council and the Ramblers Association who want the exclusion confined to the garden ground immediately adjacent to the Snowies' house.
Sheriff Andrew Cubie said he would have to "draw a line on the map" to resolve the dispute.
Calls for reform of the legislation were made after Sheriff Michael Fletcher granted the Stagecoach tycoon Ann Gloag the right to ban the public from 10 acres of her estate in Perthshire in June. Mr Lochhead however said that the government review would not be based on one court case, but on how the legislation had worked in general.
Mr Morris said that although some adjustments might be needed to the law, fundamentally, the legislation was working very well.