GREEN LAIRDS, GREEN WASHING AND SQUANDERED BILLIONS: HOW THE SNP/GREEN GOVERNMENT IS FAILING SCOTLAND
ScotWind cost public purse £60bn, wealthy 'green lairds' profiteer from ScotGov policy while rural communities lose out and a new policy disaster in form of Highly Protected Marine Areas is looming
There needs to be far more scrutiny of the many ways in which this Scottish Government is failing our rural communities, the fight against climate change, and the public purse. Whether it is the £60 billion lost to the public purse circa ScotWind, the rise of ‘Green Lairds’ and questionable carbon capture greenwashing, failure abounds. And with the Highly Protected Marine Areas (HPMAs) looming on the horizon, things might be about to get significantly worse for rural Scottish communities
ScotWind debacle
ScotWind is the auction process which has been described by Dr Craig Dalzell as “the largest auction of Scotland's offshore wind resources to date”. The auction process was handled by Crown Estate Scotland (CES). For those who do not know CES is a commercial enterprise under Scottish Government control charged with managing land and property in Scotland. But the problem which has likely cost the public purse £60bn involves CES handling of the “ScotWind” auction process.
The Herald reports that Scotland “is expected to lose £60bn including billions from the public purse through the surrender of nearly two thirds of the potential supply chain bonanza and the 'underselling' of leasing rights for the offshore wind revolution”.
Dr Craig Dalzell sat down to talk to Jonathon Shafi and explained that “the auction had a maximum price cap and the seabeds had a price ceiling, rather than a price floor. The auction said you cannot bid more than a certain amount. That amount was initially set at £10,000 per square kilometre. Several organisations looking at the price of offshore wind around the rest of the UK, and the world, were saying that this price cap was far, far too low. So Crown Estate Scotland, who ran the auction, raised it to £100,000 pounds per square kilometre. One of the victorious bids managed to win their bed based on that lower £10,000 limit. The other 19 won their beds based on putting in a bid of £100,000 pounds per square kilometre. So all of the beds won at the ceiling. Not less, not more.”
Now I don’t know about you, but this strongly suggests to me that the market could have stomached a significantly higher price had the auction been permitted to be competitive. Sadly for Scotland, this proved not to be the case here.
To quote Neil Mackay of The Herald,
“The SNP bleats endlessly about having no funds. It can’t give striking teachers a rise, it claims, as the cupboard is bare. Scottish councils face shedding 7000 jobs and immolating public services due to budget shortfalls. Let’s be clear, if the claims of £60 billion being squandered are true, then matters would be very different today.”
That the Scottish Government could get things so spectacularly wrong merits an independent public enquiry into these matters. This negligence has proven costly for Scottish taxpayers and you would be correct to feel fury and outrage. This Scottish Government has effectively hurled billions down the toilet and pulled flush concerning the chronic mishandling of the ScotWind auctions. Never again can this 16 year long administration blame Westminster or ‘London’ for a squeeze on the public purse, not when its own incompetence squandered £60bn - which our schools and hospitals badly need.
Rise of the Green Lairds
If you thought the ScotWind auction debacle was bad, wait until you learn about how the Scottish Government policy has facilitated the rise of ‘Green Lairds’.
If we cast our minds back to a Ministerial Statement to Scottish Parliament (31 March 2022) by Màiri McAllan (Minister for Environment and Land Reform at the time) we observe a celebration of private investment in Scotland’s natural capital. Nothing wrong with private capital being invested into spheres which includes Scotland’s land, soils and natural habitats, providing said investment proves responsible.
Let me be clear, responsible investment should benefit wider society, boost communities interests as well as those of the landowners. But if this is the measure we are to apply, the Scottish Government clearly falls short.
Being fair, the Holyrood government did publish its Interim Principles for Responsible Investment, which highlights an awareness of a need for a broader benefit beyond merely landowners. A pity then that Scottish Government policy has been falling short of standards and goals they themselves realise are of importance.
The John Muir Trust last year highlighted the surge in wealthy individuals scrambling to buy land in Scotland
“It reported that over the previous year, property firm Savills had sold 26 sporting estates for a combined total of £90 million. In 2021, the same firm announced another “extraordinary year for the Scottish estate market” with a 98% increase in the number of wealthy clients registering to buy land”
But these wealthy clients are unlike those who have historically went before. The interest is less in the grouse and deer and far more in something else…tree planting.
You read that right, the surge in estate and land values in Scotland is being driven by wealthy clients (individuals and businesses) eager to obtain land suitable for tree planting. Surely this is good news all round? More trees, less pollution, Scotland’s the winner. So, what’s the bad news I hear you ask.
For one thing, as large tracts of land are commandeered by a small clutch of wealthy clients from all over the world, local communities are shut out. The current trajectory has hindered the drive for a more diverse community ownership patterns in Scotland. Put simply, one downside is the negative impact this is having on land ownership in Scotland.
Currently the Scottish Government doles out a mixture of tax breaks and subsidies, offered up to cut carbon emissions. According to the former Labour Minister Peter Peacock, the Scottish Government is not facing up to the threat posed by the new ‘Green Lairds’.
The Press and Journal reports that
“The new generation of landowners have been accused of pricing out community groups in the rush to offset their carbon and take advantage of government support for tree-planting and other initiatives.”
Here we have a situation where the estate market for land is largely unregulated free market free-for-all. Rich international clients with good intentions mix in with big businesses eager to ‘greenwash’ their balance sheets all rushing in to snap up our highlands and islands.
In effect this is driving up land prices, making a small clutch of landowners exceptionally wealthy while the local communities are left scratching around for crumbs from the table. We can hardly call this emerging situation an example of responsible private investment. And that the Scottish Green Party would be so closely implicated in a situation which has in certain respects set back land reform is a betrayal of their won self-described principles.
To quote Mr Peacock, “Huge parts of Scotland are being sold off in this dark market with no questions asked”. One wonders where on earth our Scottish Government ministers are, they’re certainly not standing up for Scotland in the case of landownership, the rise of green lairds and the fire-sale of the very land beneath our feet.
Furthermore, there are plenty of reasons to question whether this is actually helping the fight against climate change. One of the major drivers behind wealth businesses rushing for real estate in rural Scotland is carbon offsetting.
Ethical carbon offsetting doesn’t include incentivising fossil fuel spouting big businesses to carry on as usual in return for planting a bunch of trees in Scotland. To quote the John Muir Trust,
“Every square kilometre of our land that is effectively requisitioned by an airline firm or an oil company, to relieve them of responsibility to reduce their carbon emissions, is a square kilometre that has been neutralised in the fight against climate change.”
Carbon capture must be done properly, but the market (much like the buying & selling of land) in Scotland is largely unregulated. Andy Wightman, formerly an MSP for the Greens before he was treated disgracefully by his former colleagues and squeezed out, highlights many of these issues in his book ‘Who Owns Scotland’.
“Anyone from anywhere can buy as much land as they like,” he explains. Mr Wightman correctly notes that while most Scots really don’t object to foreign individuals or businesses owning land in Scotland, the problems arise when the question of how it benefits the local communities is overlooked. He explains that “a level of incomprehension that important assets, which impact upon local economies and the environment, should be just sold to the highest bidder – no questions asked.”
Some, far more cynical than I could say the ‘no questions asked’ mindset intermingling with levels of ‘incomprehension’ perfectly describes this Scottish Government.
Fresh mistakes: Highly Protected Marine Areas (HPMAs)
Finally we turn to the third prong in my case-study in Scottish Government failing our rural communities and wider fight against climate change. Let’s talk about the new brainchild policy idea called ‘Highly Protected Marine Areas' (HPMAs).
The policy proposal is simple enough, the Scottish Government wishes to bar commercial activities from a tenth of Scotland’s coastal waters. You read that correctly, the SNP and Scottish Greens plan to severely curtail commercial activities (fishing and all other assorted aquaculture) from a full tenth of the entire coastal waters of the nation.
Naturally such a suggestion has sparked a fierce backlash from every rural coastal community in existence in Scotland. So much so, Ministers have been compelled to leave their chauffeur-driven cars and actually walk on something other than their softly carpeted Edinburgh offices. Mairi McAllan, Net Zero and Just Transition Secretary, has been at pains to reassure everyone that she is “listening” to “concerns” as she has overseen a consultation process on plans for HPMAs.
But my biggest concern with her reassurances and tour of the regions is that I have actually read the socio-economic impact assessment. The issue? For the life of me it doesn’t appear to include potential for population loss. That such a huge oversight - of truly epic proportions - has already happened suggests this will unfold about as competently as the suspended bottle return scheme. Remember, HPMAs would severely curtail fishing and aquaculture and thus obviously contribute to further population decline in the rural communities affected by the job losses. The need to get the impact assessment right is blindly obvious. Pity then we are landed with the dream team of Humza Yousaf, Lorna Slater and the gang. Ms McAllan needs to spend less time on reassuring us all she is “listening” and actually fix the total trainreck of a policy drive, and re-do the socio-economic impact assessment to actually factors in population loss potential. Maybe then I and others will feel a tad more “reassured”.
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