LAND reform campaigners gathered outside Holyrood yesterday calling on ministers to stop the eviction of a tenant farmer and his family from a farm they have lived and worked on for more than two decades.

The Our Land coalition, supported by campaign group 38 Degrees, rallied in support of the Patersons of Arran, who face losing their home and livelihood in 10 days’ time.

Ian Paterson, 26, whose father and mother took on the Glenree holding in 1996, said his family, including his brother John and nephew Logan, age eight, were devastated at the prospect of moving off the land they love.

“My father is not in a good way at all and it’s very difficult for me too. It’s heartbreaking, is the best way to put it,” he told The National.

“We have 10 days to pack up and sell everything we have accumulated in 22 years. My brother John’s wee boy Logan crawls into his father’s bed every night and asks: ‘Daddy what’s going to happen?’”

Paterson added: “If the Scottish Government don’t step in to help my family, we’ll lose our home and our livelihood.”

The land reform movement has called for right-to-buy tenant farming legislative reforms legislation and urgent facilitation of the legal process to protect families.

Six farmers who face eviction from their farms have taken the Scottish Government to the Court of Session in Edinburgh after the Government refused to look into their claims for compensation.

Tenant farmers across Scotland were granted the right to stay on their farms for generations by a law passed by the Scottish Parliament in 2003.

A decade later that law was ruled by the Supreme Court to be illegal and against the human rights of the landowners, and in 2014 an order was passed by the Government giving land rights back to the landlords.

Earlier this month, the Court of Session was told that this legal move led many landlords to evict their tenant farmers and take back the full possession of their property.

Andy Wightman, the Lothian MSP and land-reform spokesman for the Scottish Greens, was among those supporting the farmers outside and inside Holyrood yesterday.

Speaking inside the chamber he challenged ministers to act on the need for emergency legislation to stop the eviction of tenant farmers across the country.

He used General Questions at Holyrood to highlight the issue of mediation and compensation promised by the Scottish Government, which he said had not been forthcoming.

Wightman, whose parliamentary motion on the subject has gained support from Green, Labour and Liberal Democrat members, then spoke outside Parliament at the rally.

“Tenant farmers and their families are facing eviction through no fault of their own. Businesses and livelihoods are about to be lost. This huge mess is made even worse by the fact that I have been warned against questioning ministers on the issues at hand,” he said.

“The rural economy secretary’s response, that the Government will consider the outcome of the current court case brought by tenant farmers, does not end the uncertainty.

“We must have emergency legislation to halt evictions and we must see mediation to enable farmers and landlords to reach a settlement.”

The Patersons’ plight follows the eviction of Andrew Stoddart and his family from the Colstoun Mains farm near Haddington, East Lothian, almost a year ago.

Kenny Gibson, one of a group of SNP MSPs outside Holyrood yesterday, told The National: “My understanding, having spoken to the Cabinet Secretary, is that emergency legislation would need cross-party support for it to go through, which is unlikely. But, even if that was the case, emergency legislation would breach the ECRH [European Convention on Human Rights].

“The Scottish Government has funded mediation on both the tenant’s and landowner’s sides, and we hope this mediation will come to fruition. The landlord would have to take on significant liabilities.

“There is a lot of work going on in the background to try and ensure this eviction does not go ahead. We are confident that despite the shortage of time the landlord will see sense and not proceed.”