Chamber and committees

We continue to promote rural home ownership grants throughoutrural Scotland through distribution of our brochures which explain thescheme.

In north east Scotland, copies of the brochures have been placed in AberdeenshireCouncil’s local housing offices. In addition, the Rural Housing Service has recentlystarted working with local people and community groups in Aberdeenshire to makethem aware of grants that are available and how they can be accessed. This includesproviding information about rural home ownership grants.

Angus Council’s website alsocontains information on rural home ownership grants.

Table 1: Number of new and improvedhomes supported by the Development Programme approved by Communities Scotland.

Total Approved Units by LocalAuthority Summary 1999-2000 to 2005-06

Table 2: Number of new and improvedhomes supported by the development programme completed.

Total Completions by Local Authorityfrom 2002-03 to 2005-06

Where the Scottish ministersact as the promoter of trunk roads schemes requiring the compulsory purchase ofland, the information requested could only be obtained at disproportionate cost.

Rural home ownership grants aretargeted at areas where people have limited opportunities to build or buy a homethat meets their needs within their own communities. Grants are targetedat local people in employment who are first-time buyers. Previous homeowners canapply for grant assistance, although any capital gain from the sale of previousproperty is taken into account when deciding whether an application can be consideredfor funding.

Grant applicants should be onlow or modest incomes and are means tested. Grant awards are the minimum necessaryto allow projects to proceed, and do not normally exceed 33 per cent of approvedproject costs.

The size of the applicant householdis used to determine the size of the property that can be funded.

Sales of Council Dwellings: 1999to 2005

Source: Sales 3 returns by localauthorities to the Scottish Executive Development Department Analytical ServicesDivision (Housing Statistics).

Notes:

1. Figures shown are for allsales including sales to sitting tenants,rent to mortgage, voluntary sales, sales to private developers, voluntary transfersto registered social landlords, tenants’ choice sales and other sales.

2. Due to housing stock transfers,figures for Dumfries and Galloway, City of Glasgow and Scottish Borders are excluded from 2003 onward, andthe percentage change between 2002 and 2003 is therefore not shown.

3. The following symbols areused:

- nil.

.. not available.

na not applicable.

Where the Scottish ministersact as the promoter of trunk road schemes a draft compulsorily purchase order (CPO)is prepared for the acquisition of all land and property required to build the scheme.The schedule to the CPO gives a description of all plots including any propertiesto be acquired. There are no separate records kept of the number of homes acquiredfor each scheme. Residential properties included in a draft CPO are often acquiredby agreement in advance of the making of the order thereby enabling the owners topurchase alternative accommodation at the earliest opportunity.

The following table shows averageNet Farm Income estimates for Scotland for accounting periods 1999-2000 to 2004-05:

Source: Farm AccountsSurvey.

Notes:

1. Net Farm Income (NFI) representsthe return to the farmer and spouse for their manual and managerial labour and hasbeen calculated on a tenant-type farming basis. As the majority of farms in Scotland areowner-occupied, NFI estimates ought to be treated with some caution as they do notrepresent all the income of owner-occupied farms.

2. NFI results, which are generatedfrom the Farm Accounts Survey, are representative of eight main farm types in Scotland. Theydo not include incomes from farm types such as pigs, poultry or horticulture.

3. NFI results are only representativeof farms in Scotland above an economic size threshold of 0.5 standard labourrequirements.

4. Methodological improvementswere introduced to NFI estimates in 2002-03, so there may be a slight break in theNFI series in this period.

There are two main sources ofinformation on farm incomes :

The Farm Accounts Survey providesresults on average farm incomes at the national level, however the sample size of460 farms is insufficient to provide reliable or representative results at the localauthority level.

The Total Income From Farming(TIFF) measure is compiled at a national level using a range of national data sources,as such TIFF estimates are not produced at a local authority level.

The farming sectors are definedusing a European classification and take into account the main agricultural activityof the holding.

Source: June AgriculturalCensus.

Notes:

1. The arable sector consistsof cereal, general cropping and horticulture holdings.

2. The “other” sector includespigs, poultry and holdings with mixed activity.

3. There are a large number ofsmall holdings that do not report any labour in the June Agricultural Census. Thesehave not been included in the results above.

4. As the holding classificationis updated every year, individual holdings can move between sectors depending onagricultural activity reported on the June Agricultural Census. This should be notedwhen considering trends within specific farm sectors.