Scottish Rural Communities Policy Review: West Lothian case study

Key learning and recommendations from West Lothian

Community Led Local Development was considered very important, delivering multiple benefits and supporting elements of community and business activity that were often not fundable in other ways. Participants considered this integral to supporting community resilience, with some noting that this funding allowed them to ‘fix the boiler and keep things running’.

Participants suggested a number of improvements to the procedures and processes of applying for Community Led Local Development funding. Timescales and the complexity of applications, claims and reporting were considered to deter some from applying and were highly recommended for changes in the future. In particular, participants said that having multi-year funding would mean that organisations in West Lothian could build strategic projects rather than respond in an ad hoc manner.

West Lothian experiences different challenges to some of the other rural communities in our case studies. It is important that the approach from national initiatives such as Scottish Rural Action and the Scottish Rural Network take this into account to ensure that their work is relevant to West Lothian and other post-industrial communities.