INTERPRETATION (Hansard, 2 March 1976)

§ Mr. Douglas Henderson (Aberdeenshire, East)
I beg to move Amendment No. 31, in page 18, line 34, at end insert 'and shall additionally for the purposes of section 1(2) include anyone who holds a dwelling-house and garden ground as a tenant-at-will, stance holder or kindly tenant'. This is a specialised subject which concerns many constituencies, particularly in the North-East of Scotland. The terms "tenant-at-will", "kindly tenant" or, in Banffshire, "stance holder" refer to a fairly specialised kind of tenant. It is a form of tenancy that has lasted for several hundred years. Houses are bought and sold like motor cars or other movable objects. Although there is no security of title in the feudal sense, the system has worked very well and it has been a cheap method of transferring title to property. It has been understood and fully accepted over that period.
But problems have started to arise in the last few years. Many of these houses are in picturesque fishing villages like Stonehaven, Pittullie, Cairnbulg and In-verallochy in my constituency, but they lack modern amenities such as proper bathrooms, sanitation and larders. Such a tenant cannot get an improvement grant from the local authority because he cannot produce a feudal title.
Some months ago, I took up with the right hon. Member for Glasgow, Craigton (Mr. Millan) the question whether, if the law could not be changed, local authorities could be empowered to accept evidence that someone was a tenant-at-will, stance holder, or kindly tenant, as adequate for the award of improvement grants. After considering the matter carefully, he advised me that nothing could be done.
1265 Such tenancies often go back, in the same family, to the sixteenth or seventeenth century. Nevertheless, they cannot obtain improvement grants. The way to do so is to apply to a feudal superior for a feudal title. Many superiors have been co-operative, and have granted a feudal title so long as the tenant-at-will pays the legal costs. That is a satisfactory and enlightened arrangement.
But that is not the whole story. Some feudal superiors have been grasping and greedy and have demanded extortionate sums for a feudal title. In some cases, a tenant-at-will who had years previously been granted a feudal title for the ground on which the house stood has asked for title to a patch of adjoining ground on which to build a garage, only to be told that he cannot have it or that it will cost several hundred pounds and the legal costs. That is blackmail: people should not be treated like that in this day and age.
I am disappointed that the Government have not dealt with this situation before now. I raised this matter in the Scottish Grand Committee on 25th June 1974. At the end of the debate, the Lord Advocate talked about the Government's future plans for reforming land tenure. He said: The previous Labour Government set out a clear series of stages in the White Paper of 1969. Clearly, the intention would be to follow through the squence of events that was there set forward. Phase 1 of the Labour Party's programme of 1969 was the 1970 Conveyancing Act. Now— 25th June 1974— we have phase 2, which is the Bill, for stopping feudalism providing for the redemption of existing feuduties. Phase 3 will be the major measure which will be required to reform land tenure entirely in Scotland and abolish the feudal system as we know it.… We are extremely anxious to press ahead as quickly as posible with phase 3, with the full reform of land tenure. … I attach the greatest importance and urgency to getting the phase 3 operation under way.—[Official Report, Scottish Grand Committee, 25th June 1974; c. 48–9.] 12.15 a.m.
I have been in correspondence with the Lord Advocate over the months since 25th June 1974, and I am afraid that I am becoming a little impatient about the time that it is taking the Government to deal with this situation, especially about the time that it is taking them to deal with 1266 the problems which many hundreds of people in the North-East of Scotland have to face.
I suspect that it will be argued tonight that this is the wrong Bill in which to implement this type of change. That may be so. But it is the only Bill to have come forward in which we have had any chance to do something for these people. I hope that we shall have some assurance about what is to happen. May we be told for example, that the Government are prepared to try to give local authorities the right to give tenants-at-will improvement grants without their having to exhibit a feudal title? If that could be done, many of the difficulties would be removed.
These people deserve a break. It is high time that they had one. I ask the Government to bend their minds constructively to this problem and to give us an answer which holds out some hope for these people in the future.

§ Mr. Buchan
I am interested in this matter because I know a little about the problem, without necessarily having any solutions to offer.
I ask the Government to consider the latter point made by the hon. Member for Aberdeenshire, East (Mr. Henderson). Most of us understand the difficulty of including such a provision in this Bill, which is designed for the specific problems of crofting tenure, and the difficulty that there would be in bringing in this additional definition at this point in the Bill. But is not it possible for the Government to consult the local authorities affected to see whether, if not the whole problem, at any rate this question of improvement grants can be dealt with?
This is not a problem affecting my own area, but clearly it would be of great benefit if the Government could persuade local authorities to act, or give them the necessary power to do so. It might have to be done by a statutory instrument extending the regulations affecting the improvement grant. If that were so, I am sure that the House would give such a measure a swift passage.
Whether the Government can go further and deal with the problem of unfair demands by the superior, which we tried to deal with in the 1970 Act, so that the Land Court could waive unreasonable demands is another matter. But at least 1267 it would be a helpful step affecting many hundreds of people, and it could be done between the Government and the local authorities or by the Government alone.
I hope that we shall receive a favourable answer.

§ Mr. Hamish Watt (Banff)
In proposing this amendment, my colleagues and I are well aware of the principles involved, and we are grateful to the Minister for honouring his pledge to my hon. Friend the Member for Western Isles (Mr. Stewart) to allow the matter to be discussed at this stage.
Although I agree with much of what my hon. Friend the Member for Aberdeenshire, East (Mr. Henderson) said, I think that the Bill applies precisely to tenants-at-will, stance holders and kindly tenants. The Bill allows crofters in the crofting counties to buy the land on which their houses stand and also their garden land. If we extend the principle to the people we have mentioned, the stance of the house will be made available to the householder. As the principles of the Bill are the same, the geographical area should not matter.
Even more important than the problem of improvement grants for housing are the restrictions placed on the sale of such houses. These houses were built in a particular area for historic reasons. Often the local blacksmith, local joiner, or steelwright, was given the stance by the landowner centuries ago so that he would settle in the area and offer his skills to the community. Tenancies have changed over the years and each time they change there are difficulties because there is no title to the house.
In many cases such properties are not eligible for improvement grants and their condition therefore deteriorates. In some cases they have been abandoned. That is what many landlords want and successive Governments have played into their hands. Some of these houses in Banffshire are now falling vacant. It is a deliberate policy of some landlords to continue the process begun by the Highland clearances.
Not many people in Scotland are involved, but if we established this principle, those householders would have something to look forward to. The Government must take this opportunity to right this wrong and to end the harassment 1268 which has been going on for too long. In my constituency some landlords are refusing to allow electricity supplies through their estates to the type of houses we are now discussing. The acceptance of our proposal would be a step towards creating social justice in Scotland.

§ Mr. William Ross
We have been drawn into the fascinating sideline of land tenure. I sympathise with the argument, because I was a member of the Guthrie Committee on long leases. People thought that there were very few long leases in Scotland, but we discovered that there were several thousand, starting in a place called Stonehouse, where leases were falling in. We even discovered a long lease in Ayrshire near Kilwinning which had an element of endurance about it—it was a lease of 9,999 years.
The point about the long lease is that the land superior is not required to produce a title to the land, and that particular feudal superior probably did not have a title because it was from the Abbey lands of Kilwinning. We eventually produced a formula to give people the right to long leases. We unearthed the subject of kindly tenants, stance holders and tenants-at-will—all of whom have a history related to an area. Theirs could be said to have been the houses of the soldiers of the local laird. When the soldiers returned from the wars, they were encouraged to settle and were given these positions.
We tried to deal with the people concerned then and could not, because they were already being treated virtually as people who already had feus. There was a celebrated case concerning a kindly tenant in Kilmarnock. I shall not go into it at this hour, but it is a fascinating sidelight on history. If hon. Members look up cases in their own constituencies, they will probably discover far more than they would imagine.
I have sympathy with the case and I applaud the efforts of hon. Members who have raised the matter. The tenants concerned, who are comparatively rare, are found mainly outside the crofting counties. We hope to give them title when we come to the final legislation. I cannot say when that will be. Anyone who has looked into the question appreciates its trickiness, and it takes time to deal with it. We have not been 1269 idle in the past two years about passing legislation, and I am sure that the hon. Member for Western Isles (Mr. Stewart) will be the first to applaud us for enacting this measure.
I shall look into improvement grants. Not only local authorities but building societies are involved, and I cannot suggest that I have much influence with the building societies, because they are probably more tied down. The real solution is to deal with the matter in the right Bill.
In view of my explanation, that, although we are sympathetic, it would not be right to act in the Bill in the way suggested, I ask the hon. Gentleman to withdraw his amendment.

§ Mr. Henderson
I am grateful to the right hon. Gentleman for his understanding of the problem. I hope that he will write to me and my hon. Friend the Member for Banff (Mr. Watts) fairly soon on the subject of improvement grants, which is a pressing matter for many of those concerned.
I also hope that the right hon. Gentleman will jog the memory of his right hon. and learned Friend the Lord Advocate and all those dealing with the land reform measure, so that we may have the kind of change in Scottish land law that many hon. Members and people in Scotland want.
In the circumstances, I beg to ask leave to withdraw the amendment.

§ Mr. Hugh D. Brown
I beg to move Amendment No. 32, in page 18, line 36, at end insert— '"development" has the same meaning as in section 19 of the Town and Country Planning (Scotland) Act 1972, except that it includes the operations and uses of land referred to in paragraphs (a) and (e) of subsection (2) of that section;'. In Amendments Nos. 11,21 and 30 we have introduced a concept of development into Clauses 3, 9 and 10. The purpose of the amendment is to define the meaning of "development" as used in the Bill. The effect is that "development" will have the same meaning as in Section 19 of the Town and Country Planning (Scotland) Act 1972, except that it will include certain maintenance or improvement works and the use of land 1270 and buildings for agriculture or forestry, including afforestation, which are excluded from the 1972 Act definition.