Applecross Trust rejects applications
The Applecross Trust has issued a Media Release at 1523hrs today 13 November 2012 (copied below)
The Trust has refused all applications for membership.
We fail to see how opening up the membership of this charity would not “have delivered any benefit to the peninsula, particularly in light of the fact that so many of the applications for membership had no connections with the peninsula whatsoever.”
The existing six members of the Trust (including Charles Peregrine Albermarle Bertie who is now 80 yrs old and must retire as a Director) live in Berkshire, Edinburgh, Inverness, Newcastleton, Reading and Hampshire! Their only connection with the peninsula is that they own it.
Moreover, the claim that “More importantly, the local community – whom we consulted – share this view” is interesting. What form did that consultation take? Was everyone in the community consulted? Does this alleged consultation have any relation to the flawed and misleading petition mentioned in a previous post?
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13/11/12
APPLECROSS TRUST TO DEVELOP COMMUNITY ENGAGEMENT INITIATIVE
(Issued on behalf of The Applecross Trust)
The Applecross Trust announced today it is to develop the Applecross Landscape Partnership Scheme (ALPS) which is regarded as a highly successful and productive community engagement initiative.
ALPS will be reviewed and developed for the future when it completes its current programme of projects and will involve a wide range of community organisations and representatives from the Applecross peninsula.
The ALPS scheme (www.visit-applecross.org) aims to conserve and promote the cultural and natural heritage of one of Scotland’s most scenic areas. It involves seven separate community-based organisations and has been successful in delivering more than 40 local projects.
Archie MacLellan, Administrator of The Applecross Trust, said: “The Trust is proud of its success in promoting community engagement for many years but it agrees with the community that there is always scope for innovation and moving forward.
“We will therefore strive to strengthen the various partnership groups so as to take new ideas forward in tandem with them on an ongoing basis, in particular through the development of the Applecross Landscape Partnership Scheme. The message we have received from the local community is that the overwhelming majority of local people support the Trust and its work and believe this is the best way forward.
“Recently, we have witnessed the Land Action Scotland campaign which ostensibly wanted to improve local accountability. In reality, it is a politically motivated campaign to gain control of The Applecross Trust. The Trust does not think this would have delivered any benefit to the peninsula, particularly in view of the fact that so many of the applications for membership had no connections with the peninsula whatsoever. More importantly, the local community – whom we consulted – share this view. We have had many messages of support from the community who have made it clear that this campaign has been unwelcome.
“The Trust has respectfully refused the applications and looks forward to continue working with the local community, as we have always done, to deliver enduring and meaningful public benefit to Applecross which is the core objective of this Trust.”
ENDS
For further information:-
Ramsay Smith
Media House
m: 0141 220 6040 / 07788 414 856
e: ramsay@mediahouse.co.uk
Christine MacKenzie
Media House
m: 0141 220 6040
e: christinemack@mediahouse.co.uk
The sheer arrogance of the Applecross Trust! The only
consultation thay had with the locals were the 2 “feel-good”
letters sent out to the community.
They are a charitable company reaping from the tax (or no
tax) benefits that this enfolds. It’s true that the ALPS scheme which they mention has been very successful but I
believe this has been mainly funded by a grant from the
Lottery Commission. Infact most of the work on the estate is
funded by government grants of one sort or another.
Well it wouldn’t be the Charity Commission, it would be the Office of the Scottish Charity Regulator. the issue here is not so much an issue of charitable status but one of governance and the Charities and Trustees Investment (Scotland) Act 2005 has little to say on that question.
OSCR do have fairly stringent rules relating to private benefit though. Where the big house, sporting rights, and river are let to a private family at ridiculously low rates there must be scope for OSCR looking again at charitable status, given the rejection of membership applications.
Gary, the relevant document is section “6 Related party transactions” on p16 of the Apx 2011 accounts detailing the trustees’ dealings with the estate. This includes:-
(a) a firm called Deer Management Consultants (DMC) in which RA Wills is a partner rented the stalking on the estate for £18.5k and a holiday cottage for £1.1k (though I don’t think that was for a whole year)
(b) DMC also rents Applecross House for £7.5kpa.
The stalking and house rents were “independently negotiated”. I suspect (but don’t know so am open to correction) that means they have a letter from a respected firm of land agents confirming these are commercial arms’ length rents.
(c) RA Wills’ mother rents Applecross River fishing for a nominal £10 and we’re told this is arms length.
I’m not enough of an expert to know whether these rents are “ridiculously low” as you suggest. (Even the nominal fishing rent may be reasonable because there are no fish but Mrs W’s lease obliges her to pay the DSFB rates and/or improve the fishing – or something like that. I don’t know – I’m guessing but I hope in an intelligent sort of way.)
Whatever, there have been snide insuations that the Wills family and/or other board members are profiting personally from the Trust’s assets by paying artificially low rents and are thereby acting in breach of trust and/or contrary to charity law and thereby inviting investigation by OSCR.
I think (and I may be a lone voice) that such insinuations should not be made, however obliquely and cleverly worded so as not to be directly actionable, unless the person making them has the courage to come out and make their accusations directly, backed up with reasonable prima facie evidence, or face the consequences. And I don’t mean being threatened with a defamation suit, I mean being made to look a bloody fool in the court of public opinion. (Gary, I’m not calling you a bloody fool, I will be genuinely interested to hear from you why you think these rents are too low. I say again, I don’t know whether they are not.)
I think it’s tragic this campaign – which started with the brilliant central premise of applying for membership – has been dragged down into the mire by secrecy, disingenuous sophistry, snide insuations and even plain old schoolboy-ish poking fun at people’s names.
Why on earth couldn’t it have been left for its central truth to speak for itself without having been over-egged in this way?
I do not for a moment imagine this post will be published. It will almost certainly be blocked by Andy Wightman as being contrary to his comments policy of blocking “tedious nit-picking” as other of my comments have been. (Shouldn’t the court of public opinion have been allowed to judge that, Andy?)
For the record, I have never made any such allegations. Assertions that I have were made by Neil King on twitter and, following an invitation to retract, remain published on the internet. Anyone else making such accusations can expect more than a rude email in response.
Neil
I am sure that negotiations for sporting rents and tenancies will have been conducted in the correct manner. There is, moreover, scope for allowing necessary and/or incidental private benefit, whilst still meeting the charity test. I have made no allegations and have heard none of the guff to which you refer. I have made no schoolboy-ish remarks.
As regards house rents, a holiday home in Applecross the size of Applecross House would set you back about 3k per week in the high season. Can private benefit not be measured as the difference between market rents, and rents paid? Measured in such a way you’d have a private benefit of 100k pa. or thereabouts. Same goes for the sport and the river. Leave it to the markets, calculate the net benefit and let OSCR decide whether it meets the charity test. At the moment it clearly does, and my way of measuring the benefit may not be right, but in the light of the trust’s blanket refusal to consider individual applications on their merits one could be forgiven for questioning their motives. Unless they truly believe that – like the masters of the universe who brought financial armageddon to the city – they are uniquely competent to manage a couple of hills and a river, in which case their arrogance is simply magnificent.
The campaign cannot “be left to speak its central truth” (despite the beauty of the prose)because there are real people living in Applecross. For you and Andy Wightman this is an LAS campaign. For the people who live there it is a small part of an ongoing pre-existing struggle to keep their community alive.
Sophistry, btw, is always disingenuous!
Gary
OSCR was established when the Charities & Trustees Investment Act came into force in 2006. At this time it set up the Scottish Charity Register and all existing bodies recognised as Scottish charities were added to the Register.
However OSCR make clear that this does not automatically mean that such bodies meet the charities test, and accordingly they have been reviewing entries in the Register on a rolling basis since then.
So it is more than likely that OSCR has yet to take a view on whether the Trust meets the charities test (though I could be wrong) – the numbers involved mean it can only review a small sub-set of charities every year.
As regards the negotiated rents and whether they are appropriate – the way to test this (and at the same time deliver the maximum return to support the work of the Trust) would simply be to go to tender and offer the various opportunities openly. I am sure everyone could sign up to this as a fair and reasonable way to counter any ‘snide insinuations’.
Thanks for that authoritative clarification, Jamie. I guess an open tender process is what I meant by ‘leave it to the markets.’
It appears that there are over 23000 Scottish charities; 70 have been reviewed since 2006 with a similar number (mainly fee paying schools) currently under review. Given the figures, the phrase’rolling’ review seems a touch hyperbolic.
Applecross Trust does not appear in either list, so if the information on OSCR’s website is up to date, it would confirm that it has not been reviewed.
So I don’t know whether the charity test is satisfied; you don’t know; Neil doesn’t know; The Trust don’t know, though they confidently assert that they do; and OSCR themselves don’t know.
Of course, if there was some local representation on the board, an open tender process for the house and stalking might come up on the agenda……