The Scots reclaim their land in an ownership revolution

Supporters claim the new law is righting the bitter wrongs of the past. Others say the Scottish Parliament is waging a class war.

But last night, after centuries of struggle against feudal land laws, the four-year-old body passed a Bill paving the way for a rural revolution.

In a landslide vote of 101 to 19, MSPs passed the 69-page Land Reform (Scotland) Bill at the end of two days of debate. The vote brought to a head more than 150 years of bitter conflict between the majority of Scots and the handful of people who own two-thirds of the country under feudal laws dating back to the 11th century.

The Bill is designed to replace this system with a more straightforward form of ownership, giving small communities and individual crofters the right to own the land they live and work on, and provide greater public access to the countryside.

Critics have called the Bill a licence to "expropriate" property using nationalist policies seen in Marxist Cuba, North Korea and Zimbabwe.

But there is no doubt Scotland has the most unequal distribution of land in western Europe. In a country of more than 19 million acres, over 16 million of them are privately owned, two-thirds of which are in the possession of just 1,252 owners. Over the past 100 years very little privately owned land has been put up for sale. And at least 25 per cent of estates in excess of 1,000 acres have been held by the same families for more than 400 years.

In the agriculturally barren Highlands, many estates are still operated under a legal regime that terms owners as "superiors" and crofters as "vassals". Landlords regulate land use and impose charges for any alterations at a whim.

For centuries, landowners have been able to buy and sell their estates without any consideration for the views or welfare of the small businesses, crofters and tenants of their fiefdoms. In addition, vast areas of the privately owned countryside is fenced off, barring the public from some of the most beautiful scenery in the world.

The Scottish Parliament, unfettered by the House of Lords, where peers were certain to block reform, spent four years drawing up the legislation.

It covers three key areas – land access, the right of crofting communities to buy the land they live and work on at any time, and the opportunity for local communities to have first-refusal on any estates that come on the market.

The first part of the Bill deals with land access. Under the legislation, land managers will have to provide easy access for the public, except where potentially hazardous activities such as woodland operations and deer management are taking place.

This will be backed up by rules that operate in a similar way to the Highway Code. In return the public is expected not to damage crops and to walk round people's homes to ensure privacy. Many landowners fear the legislation means they will be liable for injuries incurred by walkers while on their estates and that increased access will result in damage to their business interests.

Among them is the millionaire Peter de Savary who says his Highland estate at Skibo castle in Sutherland, which hosted the reception for Madonna's wedding to Guy Ritchie, would lose its appeal if its privacy were compromised. The 7,500-acre estate is run as a luxury country club for the security conscious and Mr de Savary has warned he will take his case to the European courts to protect the £4m the hotel provides annually for the local economy.

In contrast, those campaigning for greater access to the countryside fear the legislation is too confusing and does not go far enough.

Dave Morris, director of the Ramblers' Association Scotland, described the Bill as "a charter for mavericks", allowing landowners to call police to help them resolve access problems and providing draconian powers to local authorities to declare land exempt from access, or place exclusion orders on individuals they deem to be acting irresponsibly.

The second, and probably least controversial part of the Bill, allows local communities first refusal to buy any land put on the open market, with salmon fishing or mineral rights, provided they have registered an interest and set up a community trust to show how they would develop it. If the land is sold in breach of the legislation to another buyer, the community can insist on purchasing it from the new owner for up to 10 years.

But the most contentious part of the Bill is the legislation regarding crofting community ownership. Although individual crofters have had the right to buy their homes and garden ground since 1976, at a fixed rate of up to 15 times their annual rent, the legislation will allow whole crofting communities to force a landowner to sell them the common grazing land as well, with mineral and salmon fishing rights.

Despite the fact that communities must show the purchase is in the public interest and pay a fair price plus compensation to the landowner, critics of the Bill have described it as little more than a licence to expropriate land.

Many water bailiffs, gillies and other Highland river workers are worried the Bill will result in the demise of salmon fishing and lead to the loss of hundreds of jobs.

"Who on earth is going to invest in conservation or improving their estates when anybody can come along and force them to sell at any time?" says David Cotton, of the Crofting Counties Fishing Rights Group, who described the legislation as toff bashing. "These estate owners invest huge sums of money in running these properties and create jobs throughout the Highlands. If small communities of crofters are allowed to take control, where are they going to find the money needed to invest in the conservation of these places?"

A study by the Highlands and Islands Rivers Association claimed that last year more than £2.5m of investment by river owners was withheld because of uncertainty over the pending Bill.

The Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors estimated land values could fall by up to 50 per cent if landowners are forced to split up their estates.

Bill Aitken, a Tory MSP and home affairs spokesman, said yesterday: "This is a land grab of which Robert Mugabe would be proud. This Bill has nothing to do with land reform, and everything to do with the other parties in this Parliament being obsessed by replaying the class wars of 200 years ago."