Taxpayers’ cash really does grow on trees... for SNP’s pet projects

Community buyout given £870k to plant woods

IT was intended as a shining example of a community buyout – as championed by the SNP – but it has been plagued by financial troubles.

Now the cash-strapped Assynt Foundation hopes to prove that money really does grow on trees.

In 2005, the residents of Assynt, Sutherland, got £2.2 million of public money to buy 44,400 acres from a landowner. But the project has failed to turn a profit.

Now the foundation has secured grants worth hundreds of thousands of pounds to plant trees. It then plans to sell ‘carbon credits’ – which private firms buy to offset against their greenhouse gas emissions.

Forestry Scotland has pledged £868,000 of taxpayers’ money for planting across 625 acres, while the Woodland Trust charity has helped negotiate the sale of carbon credits for £244,700.

But a land management expert warns mismanagement could jeopardise the future of the scheme and foundation. Former executive officer Gordon Robertson, who resigned last year, said: ‘Planting of native woodland was one of a number of initiatives included within ten-year cash-flow projections that I had produced with a firm of accountants in Inverness.

‘This capital must be used to create income-producing jobs and enterprises. It was all set out in the projections but the board has chosen not to share this with the community.’

The foundation’s scheme will also boost the Scottish Government’s efforts to plant 337 million trees by 2030.

Its estates near Lochinver – 44,000 acres including the Suilven

mountain – were bought from the Vestey family in 2005 for £2.9 million using government cash and donations, under new powers to give communities first refusal on land for sale.

Many buyouts have been hit by financial strife. We told in 2017 how the schemes made £1 million profit the previous year – after being given £2 million.

And last year the high-profile buyout in Knoydart, Invernessshire, had a £1 million bail out.

The Assynt Foundation’s land included Glencanisp Lodge, which was given a £1.25 million makeover to target the wedding venue market – a venture which failed. Relaunching it as a luxury

B&B racked up more losses. More public money was given to buy a wood-fuelled boiler – costing £87,000 – that has allegedly never operated. It costs the foundation £1,000 a month for fossil fuels to heat its properties.

Celebrations to mark the tenyear anniversary of the buyout had to be paid for using a £27,000 grant from the Highlands and Islands Enterprise quango.

The foundation now has debts of £200,000 and in 2018-19 it recorded losses of £100,000 on a turnover of £68,000 – of which £45,000 was public cash.

Harry Fone, of the Taxpayers’ Alliance, said: ‘The Government must ensure awards secure value for money for taxpayers.’

The Forestry Commission said it would only fund up to 90 per cent of the tree planting. Rural Economy Secretary Fergus Ewing said: ‘Forestry brings in £1 billion annually and supports 25,000 jobs. Ensuring continuity of supply for this vital sector is one of the driving factors that underpin our grants scheme.’

The Woodland Trust said: ‘We hope to roll out similar arrangements elsewhere.’