Socialist planning for the Highlands

Keith Openshaw's Fabian pamphlet presents a well-documented and detailed plan which could transform the economy of Highland Britain. He suggests that a Land Planning Authority be set up with powers to plant up to 7 million acres of forestry, more than double the present forest area of Britain. The land most suitable for planting is the marginal farming land at present used as rough grazing for sheep and inadequate cover for grouse. This sort of land use is not only uneconomic (if it were not for subsidies, practically all hill sheep farmers would be out of business) but also stands in the way of a flourishing forest industry, such as exists in Scandinavia, the Soviet Union and Canada, Forestry employs 10 more workers to the acre than does sheep farming, and stimulates the growth of many secondary industries, from obvious ones like pulp and paper mills to new industries with exciting possibilities like wood chemicals. Openshaw's vision foresees a time in the not-too-distant future when the repopulation nf the Highlands could become a reality, providing a model for socialist planning in all . areas of Britain. Unlike most of the left-wing press, the vested interests which have presided overthe exploitation of Highlanders for centuries have taken notice of Openshaw's ideas, And they are trying to kill the plan before the pussyfooting planners on the regional development boards begin to take it seriously. Thus Peter Simple in the Daily Telegraph has likened the planting of trees on bare hillsides to the desecration of beautiful paintings, while Robin Douglas-Home in the Daily Express has claimed that the grouse moors are really profitable (for whem?) and has defended them against the suggestion that they be "heavily taxed". (What Openshaw in fact suggests is that all under-used land should be taxed according to its potential - Home's "heavily taxed" phrase looks like an admission that the grouse moors are grossly under-used), Some attacks are even cruder: the farming correspondent of one Aberdeen newspaper with a wide circulation in the North of Scotland has described Openshaw's well-decumented facts as "half= baked balderdash", without offering so much as one fact to refute them. The indignant and irrational reactions ef such writers is, however, an encouraging sign, Not long ago they could have afforded to ignore such a plan, but after the massive Tory defeat in Highland areas at the last — election they must at least pay lip service to such words as “development”. Openshaw's pamphlet presents a socialist attack on the problem which combined realism with imagination. It should be one of the jobs of the labour movement to persuade the present Government to take it really seriously.