You’re invited! – Webinar on land reform in Scotland

Photo: World CLT Day

Do you want to learn more about community-led housing? Community-led housing, which can include Community Land Trusts (CLTs) in some parts of the UK, are models for owning and developing land for the benefit of the community. Run by ordinary people, these community development trusts typically provide affordable homes, community gardens, civic buildings, pubs, shops, and conservation landscapes for everyone to enjoy. Community-led housing  ensures that the homes are permanently and genuinely affordable, and they act as long-term stewards of land to ensure that they benefit the local community.

The South of Scotland Community Housing (SOSCH), is a community-led housing enabler that partners with local organisations to deliver affordable housing in community ownership in Scotland.  And if you wanted to know more about its work, you are in luck – it is hosting a webinar on Scottish Land Reform on 25 October as part of the second annual International Community Land Trust Festival. The festival celebrates the growth and diversity of the community land ownership movement around the world.

Join them on 25 October for a discussion on Scottish Land Reform and the land reform agenda’s ties to community-led housing and community development. The session will include presentations from the Scottish Land Commission, Community Land Scotland, and Wigtown & Bladnoch Community Initiative, followed by Q&A. This one-hour webinar will provide a lively conversation on land reform and community ownership in Scotland (and beyond), with input from policy experts, community members, and community-led housing practitioners.

Image: © Hazel Smith Wigtown & Bladnoch Community Initiative (WBCI) members pictured outside the Wigtown Former Bank of Scotland Community-led Housing and Bunkhouse project.

SOSCH is partnering with the North American charity, the Center for CLT Innovation, to host this discussion on community development, which intends to be interesting and relevant to attendees in many different countries [1] All are welcome – register here!

Otherwise, CELEBRATE WORLD CLT DAY WITH SOSCH, which is inviting all CLTs and community development organisations to participate in World CLT Day on 28 & 29 October – find out more info and how to participate at this event page.

PRESENTERS:

David Stewart is senior policy officer at the Scottish Land Commission since 2019. His main areas of work are around land assembly, placemaking, and housing land markets. David joined the Land Commission from the Scottish Federation of Housing Associations, where he led on new build affordable housing, planning reform, energy efficiency and regeneration. Before that, he worked for housing associations and for Edinburgh City Council on housing and regeneration. He is a board member of Rural Housing Scotland and was previously on the board of PAS, the planning and place charity, and a community-based housing association in Greenock. David has also served on the Academic, Practice, and Policy Panel to SURF – Scotland’s Regeneration Forum.

Linsay Chalmers is the development manager at Community Land Scotland, where she oversees the organisation’s work supporting communities and raising awareness of community landownership. She previously worked in community recycling and reuse for many years. In her spare time, Linsay is on the Committee of her local community enterprise which owns a shop, Post Office and self-catering business.

Dr Nick Walker is a retired psychiatrist, active in his local community. He was part of setting up Wigtown & Bladnoch Community Initiative, a community company whose mission is to bring neglected land and property into community ownership, in a sustainable way, to benefit and enhance the lives of the people living in and visiting Wigtown and Bladnoch. He has just finished his term as board convenor for the Initiative. He has also been on Wigtown Community Council and is a trustee of local charity The Wigtown Festival Company which puts on an annual book festival in Scotland’s National Booktown.

This grant falls under our Housing and Homelessness programme, which supports organisations which believes in a society where more people live in decent homes and fewer people experience homelessness and housing insecurity. You can find more about the programme and its strategy overview by clicking here.

[1] The webinar, presented in English, will be moderated by Annabel Pidgeon of South of Scotland Community Housing. Translated subtitles will be added to the webinar recording.