Request
I was looking at your mapping work which looked very good. I wanted to put in an FOI to understand who owned the seabed in the different areas around Scotland, as part of participatory fisheries and marine conservation research. You have various unidentified areas, and different shapes which have no information.
Clarification received 25 October
My question relates to concerns of some stakeholders about future selloffs of the seabed and the foreshore, and how to strategically support community benefits of forthcoming projects (carbon and biodiversity offsets), including fishing communities and wider coastal communities. If you have gis map layers for this that would be useful or a table if you don’t.
To help focus in, it would be good to break the question down into active council areas.
1. Which areas of the seabed out to 12 nautical miles are not owned by the Scottish Crown estate, and who are they owned by?
2. Starting with the Highlands of Scotland which areas of the foreshore are not owned by the crown estate, and who are they owned by? Starting with Highland Council region, Moray, Aberdeenshire, Aberdeen, Angus, Dundee City, Fife? (I would like to ask a follow up question to ask about the remaining council areas of Scotland later on).
3. Where rights to salmon and trout in river and coastal areas are in these council areas?
Response
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Crown Estate Scotland owns virtually all of the seabed out to 12 nautical miles around Scotland. You note concerns about future selloffs, there is a general predisposition against sales of seabed. You can read more about this here: Crown Estate Scotland guidance note on seabed ownership
As to your question about seabed that is not owned by Crown Estate Scotland, we would not be able to give you information on areas of seabed that Crown Estate Scotland does not own. This information is not held by Crown Estate Scotland.
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Crown Estate Scotland owns around 50% of the 18,000 km length of Scotland's foreshore. The exceptions to ownership of the foreshore are of two main types. Firstly, there is no Crown Estate Scotland foreshore in the Northern Isles under udal tenure, where ownership of the foreshore goes with the ownership of the adjoining land. Secondly, there are the many parts of the rest of Scotland's foreshore that have been acquired from the Crown by other landowners, much of it in the 19th century.
As to your question about foreshore that is not owned by Crown Estate Scotland, we would not be able to give you information on foreshore that Crown Estate Scotland does not own. This information is not held by Crown Estate Scotland.
With regards to future management, including sales of foreshore, and working with communities, one of the objective of the 2020 strategic management plan is “Supporting local organisations to take on ownership or management of assets, such as buildings or land, foreshore and seabed to benefit the whole community and environment” You can find out more about this plan here: Objectives, Priorities and Policies - Scottish Crown Estate: strategic management plan - gov.scot
Please note Crown Estate Scotland does not conduct research into title deeds, including historic title deed boundaries, on behalf of individuals. For research regarding title deeds, you can contact Registers of Scotland.
You can search their website for listings of title holders of the foreshore you are interested in by area for example Lossiemouth, Moray: Search by map - ScotLIS - Registers of Scotland
You can contact Registers of Scotland for further assistance here: Contact us - Registers of Scotland (ros.gov.uk)
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We have understood this question to be asking where you might find information about Coastal and Wild River fishing titles in areas not owned by Crown Estate Scotland.
Crown Estate Scotland is not the holder of information on title to fishing rights that do not belong to the Crown. This information is held by Registers of Scotland. Title to salmon fishing rights is a separate heritable title that does not necessarily flow with land ownership. This means that there is not a linkage between the title owner of land or seabed and the title owner of salmon fishing rights. They can be held by two separate parties. This information is not held by Crown Estate Scotland.
