Gresham House is now Scotland’s 2nd largest landowner
In October 2024, I published a blog highlighting the sale of a 2539 hectare (ha) portfolio of 16 woodland properties across Scotland owned by a French investment fund, Woodland Invest, based in Paris. The largest single investor owning 25% of the fund is the French state investment bank, Caisse des Dépôts, founded by Louis XVIII in 1816.
In evidence to the Net Zero, Energy and Transport Committee on 3 December 2024, I highlighted this as an example of the kind of landholding that would benefit form mandatory lotting of the sort proposed in the Land Reform (Scotland) Bill currently before Parliament. [1]
On lotting land, look at, for example, the sale of a French investment company, on which I did a blog recently. The company is called Woodland Invest, a significant share of which is owned by the French state investment bank, which was set up by Louis XVIII, I think. Woodland Invest owns a 2,500-hectare portfolio of property in Scotland— there are 16 separate properties from Aberdeenshire to Argyll and the Borders. There is one in your constituency, Mr Matheson— Slamannan. It might not be in your constituency, but it is close by. That is the land that you want to lot, because the folk in Slamannan might like a community woodland, the farmers in
Aberdeenshire might like some woodland for a bit of shelter, and a community in Argyll might want a community woodland. We should lot that, but that land would be sold as one job lot because it does not meet the threshold. It is more than 1,000 hectares, but it is completely disaggregated. That is precisely where you could step in and say, “Wait a minute.” If someone is selling 16 properties— there are some portfolios of about 30 or 40 properties for sale in Scotland—that is where you step in and lot.
The Bill proposes that sales of land in excess of 1000 ha are notified to Scottish Ministers who have the power to insist that they be sold in lots with no one owner being allowed to acquire more than one lot.
In theory this is meant to stimulate diversification of landownership but there are two significant problems.
Firstly, there is nothing to prevent a buyer agreeing privately to acquire the other lots after the lotting has been ordered and the sales have been concluded.
Secondly, the power only applies to landholdings that are contiguous with no one parcel more than 250 metres distant from another.
The kind of portfolio represented by Woodland Invest which exceeds 1000 ha in size but is spread out across the country in different parcels, is excluded. This is the consequence of the Government’s curious insistence that only large landholdings that impact on specific communities should be targeted for action. It is the consequence of abandoning any land reform ambitions designed to dilute the current pattern of concentrated ownership and provide more opportunities for individuals and businesses to own land and invest in Scotland.
As I reported in my Who Owns Scotland 2024 report, the ownership of privately-owned land is becoming more concentrated as existing landowners acquire more land at a faster rate than other landowners such as Buccleuch downsize by selling land.
And so it is regrettable to note that the fears I expressed at the Net Zero, Energy and Transport Committee have indeed come to pass. The portfolio has not only been acquired by one single buyer but by Scotland’s third largest landowner, Gresham House.
Gresham House Forest Fund VI LP acquired the portfolio on 7 August 2025. The price was not disclosed with the consideration given as “implementation of missives”, an issue that I will be blogging further about soon.
This acquisition, together with the purchase of the Griffin Estate for £145 million (reported on this blog on 1 August) now means that Gresham House owns more land than Buccleuch Estates.
From third largest landowner in Scotland, it jumps to to second with a total of at least 66,879 ha (there is more – I just haven’t yet located it all). Buccleuch Estates Ltd own around 65,000 ha.
This statistic will be confirmed in early 2027 once I have completed the review of all land sales in 2025 (I check once a year so task will not be complete until 31 December 2026).
It looks like the ownership of privately-owned land in Scotland continues to become more and more concenterated in fewr and fewer hands.
NOTES
[1] See Column 45 in Official Report of 3 Dec 2024 meeting here
Andy…. thank you for all your hard work …standing guard and highlighting the hidden usually foreign investors intent on plundering Scotland it seems at a faster and faster rate. You have to wonder what the SG is thinking and doing to protect our land…if anything.
Reading your book….The Poor Had NO LAWYERS..WHO OWNS SCOTLAND (AND HOW THEY GOT IT). Depressing so far. No-one seems to care about our ‘richest treasure’..not even our government ..except Andy Wightman.
To say that the subject is a maze of hidden laws, misrepresentations and outright GREED is putting it simply. I do not know how you keep abreast of all the tricks and devious games played by these hidden entities …who seek to make money out of our country and acquire power in the so doing.
We need RUTHLESS controls to stop the theft of our children’s inheritance. Stop the amount that investors can obtain and the land they have managed to grab…tax it to the hilt until it is no longer worthwhile robbing Scotland. Make Scotland’s land untouchable. The sooner our country is independent the better.
For OUR Scotland and her weans.
I completely agree with the points you have made Catherine and imagine anyone concerned about land reform in Scotland for the good of the general population will also agree. As well as land reform being vital in addressing the democratic deficit we have as citizens in our lack of power over how vast areas of privately owned land can be used to benefit us all and not just private owners, it also addresses historical social inequality and unfairness in the way large areas of land were gifted and acquired and became concentrated in a wealthy elite.
Can’t thank Andy enough for his tireless work in the area of land reform and detailed research on who owns the land in Scotland otherwise we would be ignorant of the facts and the truth about land ownership
I also fully appreciate the endless work that Mr Wightman has done for us all. Thank you.
Unfortunately our Scottish Lairds sold the land to foreign buyers. And we are subject to the European Convention on Human Rights: Article 1 of the First Protocol protects people from being deprived of their possessions including land.
Are you suggesting we become independent from the EU or UN? I think this it is a common fallacy that if we become independent from the UK that it will suddenly solve all our problems. Indeed it might create more as did leaving the EU. It is possible to become truly independent as we will always be subject to international laws and agreements?
In terms of Gresham House Forestry, the Scottish National Investment Bank (that’s us) own £50 million of it. We could buy more if we think that Gresham House is such a good money-maker. We would also have some control as an investor/owner.
Would we want to own more public land directly? But is that always going to be a good outcome? Who is going to manage all this land in the public interest: me, you a guy from Gresham House? Politicians: do they have the right, skills, time and energy to manage a large commercial forestry enterprise and be a politician. We have seen how many publicly run projects go badly with vast sums of public money wasted. Yes, of course local communities should have options. But who is going to pay for the land for them? And not all communities want a large estate and if they do own it, are they going to run it in the wider public interest? I’m not saying they won’t but it has to be strongly questioned if public money is involved in a purchase as they are not elected.
Excessive public ownership, i.e. large estates, could well stifle private initiative and innovation lowering wider societal benefit. In fact it often does. It’s not always a smooth ride with FLS.
That said I think it is very wrong that there are large voids of land producing very little value for us. i.e. large, intensively managed moorlands for sport and owned by absentee landlords with no wider public interest or benefit. May be these are the areas that should be tackled rather than forestry land that is being invested in, actively managed, engages with the local community and contributes to wider goals such as net zero, biodiversity, recreation and creates local jobs. Inward investment isn’t necessarily a bad thing as it brings money into the Scottish economy for us and if that money is spent to achieve our societal goals that is surely a good thing.
I also think greater transparency, different models of ownership, community empowerment, equality are all ambitions which we should strive for but stopping private investment by Gresham House in large-scale forestry per se isn’t necessarily going to help these goals.
btw I don’t have any forestry investments and only own a 12x12m garden in which I planted trees.
Snp has sold scotland to the highest bidder
They are in the pockets of the lairds who now are fabulously wealthy on govt cash
Gresham say they manage c.120,000.
Indeed. They manage some forest holdings owned by clients and not controlled by Gresham. The figures here relate to land owned by Partnerships in which Gresham is the General Partner