SLE warns sporting rates policy risks repeating family farm tax mistakes

Press Release

Axing sporting rates relief would land a severe blow on farms and rural businesses, repeating the mistakes of the botched family farm tax, Scottish Land & Estates said today.

The warning came after a meeting of the Scottish Parliament’s Rural Affairs Committee, where government officials and Rural Secretary Mairi Gougeon gave evidence on the Scottish Budget.

Believed to be at the behest of the Scottish Green Party, Finance Secretary Shona Robison announced in her budget last week that the Small Business Bonus Scheme relief will no longer apply to sporting rates from 2026-2027 - except where land managers qualify for a narrow exemption limited to deer or vermin control only. 

With no industry consultation and apparently very little consideration of the impact of the policy, land-based businesses – including family farms, not just those businesses which some politicians label as large ‘shooting estates’ – now face paying shooting rates whether shooting takes place or not. Any location where shooting rights exist will be affected by the rates liability – not just commercial shoots as claimed.

With the average farm business income for Less Favoured Area livestock farms just £17,400 according to the most recent government statistics, that leaves Scottish farms facing another potentially crippling rates bill. 

A survey carried out by SLE has found examples such as:

• A small livestock farm in Orkney using contractors to control damaging goose populations and which currently relies on Small Business Bonus Scheme relief. Under the proposals, the farm would lose that relief because geese are not classed as vermin, undermining its ability to protect grazing land and threatening both business viability and local food production.

• A medium-sized Highland estate which carries out extensive deer management alongside renewable energy and farming. Occasional letting of stalking helps fund year-round control, but the loss of SBBS relief would force a choice between increasing shooting activity or cutting deer management jobs.

• A small farm in south-east Scotland would be forced to pay sporting rates for rights it does not use and cannot avoid. The owner is now considering introducing commercial shooting simply to cover the new costs or risk the business becoming unviable.

• A large Aberdeenshire landholding managed for agriculture and environmental outcomes faces losing SBBS relief. The owner says they may be forced to expand commercial shooting to cover rates, or scale back less profitable environmental work.

SLE said the decision was yet another example of policy being developed without a proper understanding of how rural areas function in practice.

Sarah-Jane Laing, chief executive at Scottish Land & Estates, said: “This appears to be yet another policy dreamt up in a central belt meeting room, with no grasp of the real-life impact it will cause to rural businesses, jobs and livelihoods. It appears to be being pushed as a political sop to the Scottish Green Party, without any meaningful impact assessment having been undertaken. 

“While it may have been sold as a move against large estates, the reality is that small and medium-sized family farms and landholdings - many of which carry out little or no commercial shooting - will be the ones paying a heavy financial price.

“The recent revaluation of non-domestic rates is a ticking timebomb for many rural businesses that were actively encouraged by government to diversify into areas such as self-catering accommodation and retail to strengthen their long-term viability.

“The reliefs announced by the Finance Secretary amount to little more than a sticking plaster on a system that is fundamentally broken. Thousands of businesses are still facing punishing rates bills and this latest sporting rates fiasco will only intensify that anxiety, dragging even more small rural businesses into the mire at a time when many operate on tight margins and are already struggling to stay afloat.

“As it stands, this decision by the Scottish Government will translate into new rates bills of tens of thousands of pounds a year - costs many businesses simply cannot absorb.

“The exemptions to avoid sporting rates in future are drawn far too narrowly and fail to reflect how land management actually works in practice. Land managers who control animals to protect designated habitats and ground-nesting birds, safeguard livestock and food production, or manage wildlife around roads, settlements and infrastructure are being excluded from relief for reasons that make little practical sense.

“There is a clear contradiction at the heart of this proposal. At the same time as the Scottish Government sets ambitious goals on biodiversity restoration, deer management, climate action and sustainable land use, it is proposing to penalise the very people who are actively delivering those outcomes on the ground. That is why we have approached the Finance Secretary with a simple proposal to help maintain SBBS eligibility or at least broaden the scope of exemptions until the impact of the proposals are fully understood. 

“Rural Scotland has seen this movie before. Like the UK Government’s family farm inheritance tax saga, a policy devised in isolation is now threatening to inflict real damage on family-run businesses and rural communities. As with that Westminster situation, there is time to fix this if there is political will to do so. Some political figures were quick to claim ownership or support for this policy when it was announced - we now need politicians with an understanding of rural business to take a stance and drive an urgent rethink, before investment, jobs and businesses are lost.”