The Land Cruiser

Michael Russell former president of the SNP and MSP, now Land Commission chair

From time to time this site’s sister platform Grouse Beater News has reposted tweets from the redoubtable land reform activist Andy Wightman. (We don’t agree with every view he publishes.) Lately we’ve rebublished two of his long-form articles on this site. On this occasion Wightman has trained his magnifying glass on Michael Russell, the former President of the SNP, who stepped down from SNP responsibilities to take up the post of chairman of the Scotland’s Land Commission. Russell is a man who has somehow ducked most of the ire aimed at a nationalist party that is anything but nationalist, a party that has no idea Scotland is a colonised country, and thus unable to educate the populace of their lowly, beleagured predicament.

For months, Russell has been justifiably mocked, the butt of endless visual jokes, for allowing himself photographed next to a horsebox gifted to the SNP, as if a horsebox was integral to procuring an independence vote, or perhaps the new first minister had taken to horse riding as daily transport, a gesture of the environmentally sensitive.

We followed the debate about what good Russell is expected to do on an issue that is the very life blood of an independent state – the public ownership of land. It struck this author unusual that Russell slid from a ministerial post straight into a public post, head of an institution, with no ‘resting’ gap in between. Are Scottish politicians not obligated to the same scruples as English politicians? The early Russell was all bustle and revolutionary guard; the elderly Russell is more forlorn than feorlean. Wightman adds some new interest to the fast fading wake of Russell’s career. [Wightman’s view is taken from a series of his tweets.]

IT WAS WIDELY REPORTED

by Andy Wightman

At the time this struck me as very odd. Public appointments like this are made after open competition. Imagine you had applied for the post and the first you knew you had not been proposed for appointment was when you read in the media that Russell was lined up for it.

I do not know who briefed the press about this before any official announcement but it was a clear breach of confidence. For the role of Land Commissioners, Parliament has to approve the appointment BEFORE Ministers can appoint. Who leaked this information and why?

Ministers appoint the chair from among the approved Land Commissioners. None of this has happened yet. However, the Net Zero, Energy and Transport Committee did consider the matter in private session on Tuesday 12 December. So maybe we will learn more about the process soon.

When original Land Commissioners were appointed, the relevant Committee took evidence in public from those nominated. This is not required by law. There’s no information yet on whether this will happen again. Parliament will, however, have to vote on to approve candidates.

The appointment comes at a sensitive time. The SLC has been up and running for just over five years and this is the 1st change in membership and a new Chair. It is vital that the SLC is trusted as an impartial adviser to Ministers. No appointments todate have been party political.

Last week, John Nicolson MP, was concerned about links between public appointments to chair bodies such as BBC & membership of political partyforming the Government. The impression is rightly or wrongly that the SLC appointment is designed to make life easier for Government.

It remains to be seen who Ministers appoint as Members and who then as Chair. Parliament will debate the appointments in due course. It is vital that the right person is appointed and that the work of the SLC is unimpeded by real or perceived political bias.

NOTES

As ever, readers are encouraged to post comments, but you can also contact Andy Wightman on his X-Twitter account: @andywightman, or his blog site: andywightman.scot, on WordPress.

Andrew Dearg Wightman was a Scottish Independent politician, who served as a Member of the Scottish Parliament (MSP) for the Lothian region from 2016 to 2021. He was elected as a member of the Scottish Greens, but resigned from the party in 2020 and served out the rest of his term as an independent. He is also a writer and researcher best known for his work on land ownership in Scotland. He is the author of Who Owns Scotland (1996) and The Poor Had No Lawyers (2015).

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