Latest news with #Knoydart
BBC News
6 days ago
- General
- BBC News
Search for missing Swiss walker on Cape Wrath Ttrail in Highlands
Extensive searches are underway for a missing Swiss man who was on a long distance hike through some of the most remote areas in the Highlands. Bernard Trottet, 65, was last known to be at Corryhully Bothy near Glenfinnan on Tuesday 27 May. He was heading north towards Kinloch Hourn in Knoydart on the Cape Wrath trail and had planned to stay at a campsite at Morvich near Shiel alarm was raised when he failed to arrive. Police Scotland say searches have been carried out from the air and by Mountain Rescue Teams on the ground. Mr Trottet is a French-speaking Swiss national, around 5ft 10in (1.8m) tall, of medium build, with grey is likely to be wearing an orange Arc'teryx jacket, black walking trousers and a green baseball cap. He is carrying a light grey backpack and is using a light grey Zpacks tent. Sgt Brian Heriot asked anyone who had seen Mr Trottet to get in touch. He said: "Bernard is an experienced walker but it is unusual for him not to be in contact with his family, and concerns are growing for his welfare."He is believed to be wearing a distinctive orange coat and we are asking walkers and others out and about in the area to think back and get in touch if they remember seeing anyone that matches Bernard's description."
The National
15-05-2025
- Politics
- The National
Lesley Riddoch: Scotland needs real action on land reform
Maybe I am a misery magnet who attracts nothing but tales of unfair, crazy, feudal difficulties when I visit pals across rural Scotland. Maybe my shonky memory is to blame – I may not recall who I spoke to last week, but I can remember every single piece of land reform promised yet not quite delivered over the last 25 years. Maybe I have unrealistic ideas of what can be changed in quarter of a century – prompted by seismic shifts on Eigg, Assynt, Knoydart, Gigha and the rest who made a water-tight case for breaking up large landed estates in favour of capable local people. READ MORE: Immigration legislation puts minority languages like Scots even more at risk I thought we were done with piecemeal solutions. I thought all could see how absurd it is to think communities can be expected to outbid green lairds, windfarm developers and the wealthy jet set. Maybe a Caithness family surrounded with memories of clearance has made me more angry than most about Scotland's crazy land ownership 'system'. Maybe too many trips to rational Nordic countries have turned my head, filling it with countless proven ways land could be more equitably owned and purposefully used. Maybe I'm a dreamer. Maybe I'm mad. And though I clearly don't think so, that is a possibility. Because when I read that the Scottish Land Commission needs the public to tell it what a fully reformed land system might look like – I despair. Available, affordable land whose diversity of ownership is protected by the same laws and taxes that have been commonplace across northern Europe for centuries. Isn't that what EVERY party but the Tories is signed up to? If so, what's this all about? Maybe some will admire this worthy attempt to re-energise the land reform debate and applaud (slightly) before turning the page. And there's the rub. If this call for participation fails to get participants, it will endorse the prevailing political view that land reform is too difficult, not urgent enough and not top of anyone's priority list. That isn't true. We are all just weary. A government that's been in power for 17 years doesn't need the public to tell them – just get on with the job. In case anyone's looked away for the last 10 years of this column, here's a wee list of things to be getting on with. A land tax. Passed by the SNP conference last year – but clearly too hot to trot. A brake on second home ownership but not by double or even treble Council Tax rates because they don't deter the millionaires buying up scenic Scotland. The Welsh require a change of use if a home is not designated as a main residence. Why not try that? The Norwegians designate a home permanently first or second and no buyer can change the category. So, a designated first home can only ever be bought as a main residence by someone already on the local electoral register. That has worked for 70 years – why not here? A compulsory sale order (CSO) – promised since 2016 – would let councils force the sale of derelict land or buildings to a third party instead of compulsory purchase orders bringing unwelcome bits of property onto their books. The CSO is a good way around dereliction. Just do it. A Succession Act was promised decades back to rectify the unbelievable situation where children in Scotland do not have equal rights to inherit land – almost uniquely in the developed world. READ MORE: UK should not export 'proactive arms' to Israel 'on principle', Anas Sarwar says Yes, we have the right to equally inherit property from a parent, but not land, which allows large farms and estates to pass quite legally to just one offspring. That leaves other siblings (usually daughters) with next to nothing and chunks of Scotland subject to the whims of just one person (usually a very wealthy man). Across Europe, the Napoleonic code established the right to equally inherit land in 1801. Over time, equal inheritance of land splits up estates organically, and pulls down land prices as more becomes available. That also helps affordable housing, repopulation, and keeping young folk on the land. It is unbelievable this has not yet happened here. So once again, just get on with it. Amend the Crofting Community Right to Buy 2003, with a time limit on sale negotiations, so the thwarted islanders of Great Bernera, Lewis can become the first people to actually use this currently pointless bit of legislation. Review the success of our current National Parks before creating another in Galloway. Large parts of the Cairngorms are basically a blasted heath, containing ravaged land that's endlessly burnt as a driven grouse moor. And the National Parks can do next to nothing about it, or the relentless spread of second homes and short-term lets in the park. Maybe disbanding the parks and creating truly powerful local councils would do better and save money? Meanwhile, great that snares have been banned and grouse shooting licensed. But how about a total ban on muirburn? The last chair of the Scottish Land Commission, Andrew Thin, wanted monopoly land ownership to be tackled in the next Land Reform Bill. What happened to that? How about Westminster closing the loophole where woodland is bought as a tax dodge for inheritance tax, forcing up prices beyond local reach? How about Holyrood tackling the large sporting estates that pay no business rates, because they've set up trusts that qualify for small business exemptions and rebates? Some of these guys own squillions. How about a land ombudsman or commissioner as a single point of contact for the myriad individuals, communities and small businesses tearing their collective hair out over obstructionism? How about channelling money for new affordable housing through canny groups like the Inverness-based Communities Housing Trust prepared to build in small, rural areas – not volume house builders. While we're at it, redraft or repeal National Planning Framework Four – a disastrous bit of planning guidance that fixes urban templates (like the 20-minute neighbourhood) upon rural Scotland. READ MORE: Why assisted dying debate showed the Scottish Parliament at its best The result is development only in existing large towns – cos it's easier. Developments around Fife are being turned down – even farm shops – because they cannot be easily accessed by public transport. There IS no public transport in much of rural Scotland. Are locals building businesses in the countryside to be doubly penalised? Now Michael Russell isnae daft. So maybe his call for evidence is a cunning plan to get public endorsement for more radical landform proposals in time for party manifestos in the forthcoming Scottish elections. Maybe. But surely it says something that the Scottish Land Commission wants the public to get weaving while yet another underwhelming Land Reform Bill is going through Parliament. It's like a weird and self-harming form of Scottish exceptionalism. A rule, law or land tax might work anywhere else in the world, but applied to Scotland, it will fail. Or things will get fiendishly complicated. Or the delicate mix of interests will be disturbed. Or landowners' hackles will rise and government targets for reforestation, onshore wind and biodiversity will be jeopardised. So, sure let's re-imagine Scotland's land. What might it look like if Holyrood politicians were as bold as Scotland's community activists and delivered the modern equivalent of the Crofting Acts, or the high taxation that prompted one-fifth of Scottish land to be sold in the 1920s or Tom Johnston's hydro-electric revolution in the 1940s. The Labour wartime Scottish Secretary said: 'So long as half a dozen families own one half of Scotland, so long will countless families own none of it.' That was 80 years ago. So Scottish Land Commission. Be bold. You've done loads of great research. Turn those ideas into your own manifesto and shock the political establishment awake.
