LOCAL people in Assynt, the heartland of the community land-ownership movement, are about to take over the 3000-acre Little Assynt estate. The Lochinver-based Culag Community Woodland Trust has been awarded #124,000 by the Heritage Lottery Fund towards total purchase costs of #244,000, an HLF spokesman has confirmed. Highlands and Islands Enterprise's community land unit has also pledged #100,000, with Scottish Natural Heritage providing the #20,000 balance for the fast-track application.
''We have received a confirmation letter from the Heritage Lottery Fund,'' Culag trust secretary Claire Belshaw said. ''The estate agent accepted our offer on the closing date (October 12) on condition funds became available. We have an entry date of November 30. It's too early to say what our plans are. We will have to have a public meeting. Our main aim is to see 3000 acres of forest.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article