[Hamish Crofter]

Anybody got any experience of getting CCAGS grants for your croft. I'm keen to know how the paperwork was, how long the process took, how successful was the application and what you got it for.
Thanks

[oor wullie]

Aye.  I built a shed last year with CCAGS support and have received the grant.
I did some drainage earlier this year which was approved for grant assistance, due to me taking so long to fill out the claim form I am still waiting for any payment.

I have also just been approved for support with woodland creation through the SGRPID RP scheme which is nothing to do with CCAGS but gives a comparison.

CCAGS is much, much, much more straight forward than the RP scheme.

The applications are fairly straight forward.  The thing that I took a while to get my head around is that you have to quantify the benefit that what you are applying for will bring to the croft. 
Saying "a shed will allow me to store feed" is not specific enough and does not quantify the benefit, you have to say "a shed will allow me to buy chicken food in bulk.  I use 80sxs a year, costing £10 each (total £800).  If I buy in bulk (at £7 each so total £560) the shed will save me £240 per year.
It requires a bit more imagination to quantify in numbers how a drainage ditch will benefit the croft.

From submitting your application it should take a couple of months to approve but my shed took a lot longer for various reasons.  I think they aim to pay in about 6 weeks from the claim.

When submitting the claim I have taken it into the office in Inverness as they will check it at the time to ensure you have included everything needed and that your receipts are in the correct format (a big thing for them).  But then I live close to Inverness - I suspect that if you live in Skye then it is not worth coming in just for that.

Let me know if there are any specific things I can help with (remembering that I am an very amateur crofter)

[Hamish Crofter]

This is really helpful, thank you.
Just put into the council for prior notification so if that goes ok ill submit the  CCAGS form. It's quite abig one, two agri buildings and an access track so fingers crossed!

Can I ask you what size area you are going to plant up for woodland creation?

[oor wullie]

We will be planting 2ha of native broadleaf, which works out as about 4000 trees. 

You can plant woodland under CCAGS and call it a shelter belt, I don't think there is any strict definition of what dimensions a shelter belt should be so you could probably justify any block of trees if you can show it will provide shelter. 

I went with the RP scheme as it pays about 80% of costs as opposed to the 50% under CCAGS.  With 650m of deer fencing needed for my site I would have struggled to afford it without the higher rate.

[Crofter]

We had an access track on the croft improved under the CCAGS scheme a couple of years ago and the form filling was quite easy. They paid it within a fortnight if I remember rightly.

[mayya]

Assignation was done formally through Crofters Commission over 10 years ago. Since myself and himself seperated, he will not re-assign the croft to me or even to any of our 3 sons. His big idea was always to decroft and sell sites even though I know it is totally unsuitable for that purpose.

[Creagan]

Is there a size limit on CCAGS grants for shelterbelts? We can't plant 2ha as our croft is just under that size. And I wouldn't really want to plant every inch anyway.
Also looking into an access track up the back... at the moment there is no way of accessing that land without going through the (decrofted) garden of the house.

[oor wullie]

I don't think there is a size limit for shelter belts.  I think that as long as you can show that what you want will actually provide a benifit.

Surprising that the CC didn't insist on you creating alternative access to the croft land when the site was decrofted.  Our neighbours had to put in 2 gates next to each other so that the croft land could be accessed without going along the decrofted driveway of the house.

[Hamish Crofter]

Cretan, I'm doing exactly as you are, smallish shelter belt and a long access track. I'm told the only problem I may have is that apart fro the access track leading to the agri buildings it will serve as access to the house I building next year so they may say no to grant that or reduce the grant.

[Creagan]

Surprising that the CC didn't insist on you creating alternative access to the croft land when the site was decrofted.  Our neighbours had to put in 2 gates next to each other so that the croft land could be accessed without going along the decrofted driveway of the house.

It was decrofted decades ago, I believe. We only moved in this year. The croft is your usual long thin strip running from the sea to the common grazing, and the decrofted part is full width, so blocks off any access beyond the house.
I would like to put in a track at some point, as at the moment I would have to go through a neighbour's land to access the top half of the croft. I hadn't really thought of grants towards this but every little helps...