In applying the overall aim of sustainable development to the rural context, we wish to learn from the experience of the previous Government. Some of the ideas on which previous policies were based, for example partnership, were good ones, and we are happy to endorse them. But this is a Labour Government, with a fundamentally different approach on many issues, and a determination to put effective policies into practice to secure real and lasting changes for rural people. The Government believe that rural development should be driven by the priorities of local people to a much larger extent than in the past . Rural communities should be able to shape their own future and take part in the decisions that affect the economic, social, cultural and environmental well-being of their area.
Development is something that individuals and groups do.
It is not something done to them. Real sustainable development cannot therefore be a top down or prescriptive process carried out by Government. On the contrary, it is a major challenge facing local people and local communities, which to be effective should be based on a local analysis of local needs. The objective is for individuals and groups to take more responsibility for their own development, overcoming the corrosive psychological effect of decades of lack of control and the promotion of negative self-images. No single solution is appropriate across the whole of rural Scotland, and it is vital that local people are able to tackle their own particular circumstances, developing solutions which meet their needs.