Sir, – Firstly, I do realise that raising any open criticism of the government’s agricultural grants department is a risky strategy – given they are seemingly above scrutiny, or accountability, and prone to vindictive personal targeting.

But I realise my own experience echoes many crofters' frustrations. Therefore, I offer my example as clear evidence how a department, intended for rural development, is fundamentally flawed.

My story began just prior to the Covid-19 pandemic, with a simple CAGS application for 420m of fencing on February 1, 2020. (The fact that the Crofters Commission took more than 3½ years to approve my 2ha park, is a ridiculous comedy of errors for another time, perhaps?).

I continuously carry out croft improvements. A crofter learns to use their time constructively – drainage, tree-planting, barn roofing, rush clearance, ploughing, re-seeding, fencing, access tracks, etc, etc. All done without a single penny of CAGS, or other funding.

I am self-employed across two industries that were crippled by Covid-19 – the media and tourism. I am also a local employer as over the years my croft-based self-catering business had welcomed approximately 4000 visitors to the village. Not too bad for the local economy and my focus has always been on continuous improvement in all thing’s croft related.

For the first time in 15 years, I chose to ask for help. Early last spring, I submitted an application for 420m of fence under CAGS funding. Due to Covid-19, I had no work contracts, so my own labour was guaranteed. Who could have predicted that in a relatively short period of time I’d felt like I'd been treated like a thief and a fraud.

From my full application in February, I was told they could not carry out site visits. Five months later, on July 29, a site visit was carried out, no issues to report and I’d be given approval within three weeks. I had sourced the best possible quotes well in advance (as stated, I would be carrying out all the labour), so in went the school-boy paper exercises on objectives and business plan.

Not forgetting this was the same department that encourages farmers and crofters to behave in a business-like fashion. Though, within normal business practice, time is not such a wasteful luxury.

Following eight weeks of silence, I had to chase for feedback – we’re now into September – and during that period I had set in a number of fence strainers at my own cost. Ready to go as it were?

It was then early October. My croft, like many on the island suffered repeated flooding – weeks of constant deluge! To my dismay, a good breeding gimmer was drowned and I needed a safe, accessible park.

The new fence application is my answer, but still nothing is forthcoming from my local office. I was faced with working on totally saturated ground – a project I could easily have completed during the long, dry summer months.

I took the decision to start the project, with a view to making good use of time and having my animal welfare issue addressed. The local officer got in touch to inform me that I no longer qualify for grant aid because I took the decision to start fencing before costs were approved – they had known all details of my application six months prior!

I read the communication in disbelief. No mention of their own prolonged silence and constant delays in dealing with my application.

Was I really expected to wait and do nothing? If the principles of the local SGRIPD office were to be adopted, all self-employed crofters would have little choice but to cease trading. Time it seems is, indeed, a wasteful luxury. And this, in the middle of a pandemic.

Obviously, I did appeal. This was focused on the basic principles of fairness and reason. During that process, I had no offer from senior managers to talk, meet, discuss, Zoom, or find a resolution.

Do SGRIPD now operate a closed-door policy, with a desire to hide behind the convenience of Covid-19 and not offer logical guidance or reasoning? In my view, it was totally unprofessional, incompetent, and unproductive.

There was not even the common courtesy of highlighting which grant costs might not have been approved. Strainers, posts, or wire? Was it really that difficult?

My appeal was rejected. No mention of my self-employed status, no mention of my difficult personal challenges during Covid-19 and not one reference to their continuous departmental failures across eight months and for 420m of fencing. The response was based entirely from their own perspective of forms and due process.

Basically, one box was not ticket. I’d also made the fatal error of being openly honest and as regards animal welfare, they took the presumptuous view that crofters are not really able to make decisions for themselves, on their land, and their livestock.

My appeal reply letter referred to ‘not being aware of an animal welfare issue’. The suggestion was that I was somehow inventing it, or being incapable of recognising it and from individuals who had never once set foot on my croft.

In the village of Achmore, I look across some 30 empty, derelict, rush-infested crofts and concede that the government's agricultural department, intended to support crofting, is actually an active part in its inherent failure. It seems there's a culture of wasteful acceptance that doing nothing and neglecting croft-land is rewarded.

I inherited my croft at the age of 12. I am a much better guardian of that precious strip of land than SGRPID officers are of my funding rights and entitlements. I do hold a great sense of injustice as to how my basic rights to agricultural aid have been apparently mishandled.

My guess is, I’m not alone. I realise that the manner in which my 2ha plot was dealt with is probably a small part of the equation, but it raises questions about the systems aimed at supporting the sustainability of crofting. My funding battle is not over.

As well as being a self-employed crofter, I am also a parent of three young adults in their mid-20s. My message to them is simple – do not enter crofting with the illusion that government help is ever at hand. The only survival kit for rural economic growth is your own individual vision.

I will not be encouraging them to accept insult and targeting, as I have experienced. In my view, SGRIPD is an unaccountable, non-transparent government department with a licence to behave pretty much as it pleases. That needs to be addressed.

CA Mackay

Sundown,

Achmore,

Isle of Lewis.