Scottish Rural Communities Policy Review: Lochalsh and South Skye case study

What could be improved?

Constraints on timescales and purpose of funding

Participants said the short timescales for making applications for funding and then delivering projects were a challenge and worked against the development of more meaningful projects that might have greater local impact:

“I think the biggest gap with all the funding that's available now is its so short term. So I think that funding was up for a year I think and the one we applied for previously was for five months or something. And so yeah, it's quite frustrating when you're trying to do community development that you know it's going to take years to achieve what you need to achieve and you can only get funding for a year.”

Participants suggested that giving more control to people on the ground at a very local level to use the monies in the way that best suited the local community would have a greater impact, as delivery could be tailored better to local needs:

“Yeah, so when you have a really narrow funding band, in terms of what it can be used for. Yeah, we've got, you can apply for a grant for up to £10,000, but you've got to use it for, well, that doesn't quite fit. I could really use £10,000, because then what I can do is I can hire the hall to run a cafe, which means everybody can come for lunch three days a week, and I can do that for a year, because that's what we need.”

Participants’ key interest was in their local area and how they could gather the investment they needed to make the change they were seeking to make locally. Connected to this was exploring ways to enable greater local decision-making on local priorities and spending.

Limited awareness of, or engagement with, Scottish Rural Action and Scottish Rural Network

Participants reported limited awareness of Scottish Rural Action and Scottish Rural Network, although when prompted, some were aware of the activities and services provided by these organisations and some had made use of them:

“I'm aware of them [Scottish Rural Action and Scottish Rural Network]. Yes, I don't think we've ever particularly engaged or I haven't particularly engaged with either of these.”

There is scope for expanding awareness of Scottish Rural Action and Scottish Rural Network, what they offer and how their support can be accessed. One Scottish Rural Action initiative, The Scottish Rural and Islands Parliament, was well known among participants, and some had taken part in previous events. However, these participants said they had found it difficult to give up the necessary time to travel to/from the event and to take part fully, because of the small scale of their organisation.