LOAN PAYMENTS have been promised by Scotland’s Rural Economy Cabinet Secretary Fergus Ewing to help those farmers still waiting on their delayed Less Favoured Areas Support Scheme payments – but one of these farmers, 27-year-old Fulton Ronald, claims that this stopgap has come far too late.

Mr Ronald, of Saulmore Farm, Oban, told The Scottish Farmer that he is already struggling to keep up with payments that he needs to make to keep his business afloat, and would prefer ScotGov to pick up a “pen and a calculator” to get money out on time, than put any faith in its computer system.

“LFASS payments are later than last year, which I did not think would be possible,” said Mr Ronald, who has a three-year-old daughter Hayley with fiancee Lyndsay.

“I’ve had to go to the bank and extend the overdraft, and I have to pay interest on that, and when I do get the money in, how am I supposed to pay for that interest? I can’t, because the payment will not be large enough to cover it!

“I can’t understand why this funding has not been sorted out yet. Fergus Ewing said himself that it was going to be tough year, so why on earth didn’t he ensure that our payments would be in on time? Letters are apparently being sent out at the end of this month with regards to sorting out loan payments, which will then take another month to process, so we will be three months late in receiving any sort of payment, at the earliest,” he warned.

“Then, if that loan is overpaid, we have to pay interest on that extra funding, but we can’t charge them interest for being so late with the payment. I don’t understand why they have to rely so heavily on this computer system, that clearly does not work. What’s wrong with a pen and calculator? They know the sums, they know how much money we are owed, so why can’t they just work it out like that?” asked Mr Ronald.

“My grandpa always used to say to me ‘computers are going to ruin the world’ and I’m starting to think he was right!”

However, he did concede that the benefit of the delay was that the business had got on so long without its support payments that it had been obliged to become more efficient.

All the same, in the LFAs, no amount of efficiency would guarantee survival.

“At the end of the day, subsidies were not designed for every farmer in the land, and the government needs to start being more particular about who these subsidies are going to, because not everyone needs them,” said Mr Ronald.

“I quite often have people saying to me ‘oh but farmers shouldn’t need subsidies if they are running a business efficiently’, but those people are thinking about farmers living in central areas, and I always reply ‘well you try and work the land up here and see how well you do without any sort of help’.

“Up here, access to markets and animal feed is more expensive, and that makes things really difficult.”

Mr Ronald went on to explain the knock-on effect the delay has had on the businesses that supply his: “My payment is late, which means I am late with payments to other companies, which then have interest added onto them.

“If we could at least know when exactly our payment would be in, we could budget for it, but we can’t when there is so much uncertainty. At the end of the year, we look at our incomings and outgoings, and look at what we have to live on, and we also incorporate the LFASS payment into that, so when it doesn’t come in, it has a huge impact on our business and finances, and we can’t fully predict how much money we actually have.”

Mr Ronald also expressed frustration at the process which needs to be carried out in order to qualify for such payments, and the lack of support from industry bodies.

“Every year, we have to employ someone to fill out the IACS form, which costs even more money, because you just can’t afford to make mistakes on them. It’s not just some silly form you fill out to win a holiday or something, this is your livelihood at the end of the day.

“I guarantee it’s not this hard to fill out forms to claim benefits!” he added.

“The government seems to want to make it as difficult as possible to apply for these subsidies, even though it claims it wants to help farmers, but it just doesn’t look that way to me.

“Farming has become too politicised nowadays – it is just run by politicians, and I feel that NFU Scotland are a bit cosy with the government at times. Nicola Sturgeon claimed that 50% of Scotland’s land will be owned by Scotland’s people by 2020, and that’s just a ridiculous claim. The current government has put me off voting altogether now, and I used to support it,” he fumed.

Asked whether he would ever consider moving elsewhere to farm, or mirror other farming practices like those in New Zealand, he added.

“Everybody looks at New Zealand like it’s the benchmark, but it’s a completely different climate, so it’s understandable that farmers there don’t need to rely on subsidies the way we do.”

New entrants schemes have also been an unsuccessful area for Mr Ronald, who claimed that he does not qualify for any new entrant grants due to him already being a majority shareholder in the farm business: “I became a majority shareholder so that I could apply for a new entrants grant, but this was denied because I had spent capital to become a partner, and because I could not get at least a five-year lease.

“At Saulmore, the lease is currently a 1991 limited partnership which is due to be renewed soon, but our landlords aren’t willing to give us a long lease, due to the current land reform.” he explained.

“Where on earth can you even get a lease nowadays, especially when you aren’t able to offer any sort of money up front, before securing a new entrants grant?

“I just think that the government could surely come up with a better new entrants scheme than the one we have now.”

Discussing tenancies, and the changes the industry faces, Mr Ronald said: “Land reform is so difficult to understand. I try to read up on it and comprehend it, but it’s impossible. A lot of the time, I think the landlord and the tenant could probably come to some sort of agreement between them, that suits them both, without having to sign certain contracts.

Turning to mental health issues within farming, which are now receiving more attention, Mr Ronald said he was not surprised that farmers were suffering problems: “There’s so much frustration in farming just now, about the subsidies, and not enough is being said. I have started to get quite depressed about the whole thing, and I’m only 27, and I can see now why farmers do get depressed!

“The saddest thing is that the farming itself doesn’t depress me, it’s the late payments and all the paperwork, and challenges I have to face that does,” he explained.

“There’s just no conclusion to it, and I have said that if things are still like this next year, I will have to consider my future in farming, which is sad because I love being my own boss, and I’m really proud to be in charge of my own business. If I leave farming, God knows what I’ll do!”