28 February 2024

With the grace period of the RCI quickly coming to an end, time is ticking for landowners and tenants to make their submission to the register. Failure to comply with RCI requirements is a criminal offence and may result in a fine of £5000. It is therefore important that you understand what these requirements are and if they relate to you.

What is the RCI?

The Register of Controlled Interest in Land (RCI) launched on 1 April 2022 with the goal to increase transparency around who makes decisions in relation to land and property in Scotland.

The RCI shows who has significant influence or control over owners or tenants (who have a lease of over 20 years) of land and property in Scotland.

The RCI is free for anyone to submit to or search.

Terms of the RCI

The register introduces two new terms:

“Recorded Person” – the owner or tenant of land in Scotland whose interest is registered in the Land Register of Scotland or General Register of Sasines and has an Associate.

“Associate” – the person who has significant influence or control over the decision making of the Recorded Person’s dealings with the land.

Who needs to register?

It is the responsibility of the Recorded Person to make an entry in the RCI. If they fail to make an entry by 1 April 2024, or fail to keep the register updated on any changes, they will be faced with penalties of up to £5000. 

Examples of situations where an entry in the RCI would be required:

• there is an individual who has significant influence or control over decisions about what you do with the land; or
• you are in a partnership and at least one of the partners is an individual; or
• you hold the property in trust for someone else; or
• if the title is held by two or more individuals in a partnership or trust and, by consequence of death, retirement or assumption, the partners/trustees within the partnership/trust are now different to those noted on the title; or
• you hold the property for an unincorporated association, such as a sports club or village hall; or
• you are an overseas entity in which someone holds a 25% or more controlling interest.

You will not be required to register if an existing transparency regime already applies and therefore, generally, UK companies, Limited Liability Partnerships, Scottish and English Charitable Incorporated Organisations and Local Authorities will not need to register on the RCI.

What information do I need to provide?

When submitting an entry to the RCI, you will have to provide the following details:

• your name, address and, if applicable, registered number;
• the address and, if applicable, the title number of the property;
• the capacity in which you own or tenant the land;
• the name, address and date of birth of your Associate(s) or the registered number;
• the date on which the Associate’s association with you began.

An Associate may make a declaration if they believe that having their information available to the public will put them at risk of violence, abuse, threat of violence or abuse or intimidation. In these circumstances, their details can be hidden from public viewing on the RCI.

Submissions to the RCI are made online through the Registers of Scotland website and online form is designed to be user-friendly.

Submissions to the register will be available to the public 30 days after the date of submission.

Is submission a one-off requirement?

The RCI must be updated when (i) an Associate ceases to be the Associate of the Recorded Person (ii) where a new party becomes an Associate of the Recorded Person (iii) when the Recorded Person no longer owns or tenants the land and (iv) if any information supplied by the Recorded Person has changed.

Where any information has changed, the Recorded Person will have 60 days to update the register.

Who will be affected most?

The RCI rules are likely to be particularly relevant for farms and rural properties as it is commonly those types of properties that will be held in trusts or partnerships.

The trusts or partnerships will generally be within family structures and will often have undergone significant internal changes throughout the years as members die, retire, or join. As a result, the members originally noted on the title are not those with significant control over the land.

Currently the majority of RCI submissions are from the farming business and we expect to see this continuing.

Next Steps

With the deadline for submission fast approaching, we urge anyone who thinks they might fall within the scope of the RCI to make an entry.

As previously noted, failure to comply by 1 April 2024 is a criminal offence and can result in a penalty of up to £5000.

If you require assistance or information on making a submission, please contact us for further advice.

Jane Steel, Partner: js@bto.co.uk / 0141 221 8012

Amy Campbell, Trainee Solicitor: aca@bto.co.uk / 0141 221 8012