Crofting

Over the past 30 years, I have taken an active interest in the issue of landownership and land use. This first emerged in my support for the Isle of Eigg buy-out, which came to fruition in 1997. Four years earlier, the Crofting Act was put on the statute book for Scotland. One aspect of this, which allows the landowner to veto developments proposed by their tenantry (section 50B in the Act), has been highlighted by the Court of Session (the highest court in Scotland) as needing to be repealed. 

 Back in 1883, Lord Napier of Ettrick headed up a six man commission who went round the crofting areas of Scotland to gather evidence on the conditions of crofters and cottars in the Highlands and Islands. This resulted in the Crofting Act of 1886, which was the foundation stone to improve the lot of crofters. Security of tenure is an important aspect, but so is the right of a crofter (or his community, as in the case highlighted in the article linked above) to develop the land as he sees fit. The 1993 Crofting Act still allows the landowner a veto, which (to my mind) runs directly contrary to the spirit of the original 1886 Crofting Act.

St Kilda - 90 years on

In three weeks' time, it will be 90 years since the last permanent inhabitants of St Kilda were evacuated from their island. On 30 August 1930, the residents went on board HMS Harebell, which subsequently dropped them off at Lochaline in Morven and the city of Glasgow. They had requested to be relocated as conditions in their islands had become untenable, with no boats able to approach St Kilda during the winter half year. Some left their houses with the bible open at the book of Exodus and a handful of grain beside it. The houses remain today, some with roofs restored to them, and the cleits, stone storage huts, still standing.

I have no inclination to visit. The scenery is stunning, but the community is dead and gone, and I don't like to gawp. Since 2009, there has been talk of a St Kilda Centre in Lewis (at Mangersta), Harris (Leverburgh) or North Uist (Cleitreabhal); St Kilda is 40 miles west of Uist and can easily be espied from the West Side of North Uist. To remember the culture of Hiort? The designs I have seen for the Mangersta site made me recoil with horror.

My opinion? Devote a section of Museum nan Eilean in Stornoway (in Lews Castle) to St Kilda. As for the rest, leave Hiort and the Hiortach where they belong. To rest in peace.