The Abolition of Feudal Tenure etc. (Scotland) Act 2000 was a
land reform
Land reform is a form of agrarian reform involving the changing of laws, regulations, or customs regarding land ownership. Land reform may consist of a government-initiated or government-backed property redistribution, generally of agricultur ...
enforced by an
Act of the Scottish Parliament
An Act of the Scottish Parliament ( gd, Achd Pàrlamaid na h-Alba) is primary legislation made by the Scottish Parliament. The power to create Acts was conferred to the Parliament by section 28 of the Scotland Act 1998 following the succes ...
that was passed by the
Scottish Parliament
The Scottish Parliament ( gd, Pàrlamaid na h-Alba ; sco, Scots Pairlament) is the devolved, unicameral legislature of Scotland. Located in the Holyrood area of the capital city, Edinburgh, it is frequently referred to by the metonym Holy ...
on 3 May 2000, and received Royal Assent on 9 June 2000.
Provisions
The Act officially brought to an end annual
feu duties, a vestige of
feudal land tenure
In common law systems, land tenure, from the French verb "tenir" means "to hold", is the legal regime in which land owned by an individual is possessed by someone else who is said to "hold" the land, based on an agreement between both individua ...
, on 28 November 2004 (that is,
Martinmas, as the Act required the "appointed day" to be one of the
Scottish term days).
Tommy Sheridan was one of a number of MSPs who drove this change through the Scottish Parliament. After that date, the former
vassal
A vassal or liege subject is a person regarded as having a mutual obligation to a lord or monarch, in the context of the feudal system in medieval Europe. While the subordinate party is called a vassal, the dominant party is called a suzerain. ...
of an estate was the sole owner of the land, and the former
superior
Superior may refer to:
*Superior (hierarchy), something which is higher in a hierarchical structure of any kind
Places
*Superior (proposed U.S. state), an unsuccessful proposal for the Upper Peninsula of Michigan to form a separate state
*Lake ...
's rights were extinguished. For a further two years, the superior had the option of claiming compensation; this was fixed at a single payment of a size that, when invested at an annual rate of 2.5%, would yield interest equal to the former feu duty. Because
inflation
In economics, inflation is an increase in the general price level of goods and services in an economy. When the general price level rises, each unit of currency buys fewer goods and services; consequently, inflation corresponds to a reductio ...
had eroded the value of duties, which had been fixed many years before, this payment was in most cases extremely small compared with the current value of the land.
In consequence of this change in the legal basis of land-holding, the Act also reformulated the legal basis on which conditions on the use of land can be specified in the title to ownership of that land. Such title conditions (known variously as real burdens and real conditions in the prior law) were combined into "real burdens". Prior to the Act, a superior could choose to enforce title conditions, or grant a consent or waiver (usually for payment) allowing the land owner to disregard the condition even if otherwise neighbouring property owners might wish to enforce the condition. Existing conditions which were enforceable only by the superior were abolished, and only conditions enforceable by the owners of neighbouring property or by certain legal bodies on public policy grounds were retained. Transitional arrangements allowed superiors who were also neighbouring property owners to convert the old title conditions to benefit their land and hence themselves as owners of that land rather than themselves as feudal superior.
Following this change in the legal basis for title conditions, the
Title Conditions (Scotland) Act 2003 was passed, reconstituting the mechanics of how new real burdens and servitudes could be created. These two Acts, together with a third Act (the
Tenements (Scotland) Act 2004
The Tenements (Scotland) Act 2004 is an Act of the Scottish Parliament which is the main source of the law of the tenement, which regulates tenement flats.
The Act is part of a package of land reforms together with the Abolition of Feudal ...
), commenced on 28 November 2004.
See also
*
Land reform in Scotland
Land reform in Scotland is the ongoing process by which the ownership of land, its distribution and the law which governs it is modified, reformed and modernised by property and regulatory law.
Land ownership in Scotland
Scotland's land issues ...
References
External links
Legislation
Abolition of Feudal Tenure etc (Scotland) Act 2000*
Literature
* Andrew J. M. Steven:
{{Webarchive, url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130407090145/http://www.ejcl.org/83/art83-5.html , date=7 April 2013 " in: Electronic Journal of Comparative Law 8.3 (October 2004)
*
David Sellar:
Farewell to Feudalism in: ''
Burke's Landed Gentry of Great Britain: The Kingdom in Scotland''. Edited by Peter Beauclerk Dewar.
Wilmington, DE 192001, pp. xix - xxi
Land reform in Scotland
Real property law
Feudalism in Scotland
Acts of the Scottish Parliament 2000