Crofters used to be all grumpy old men in dungarees who always had noisy and poorly-maintained tractors and rickety vans.
Some of them were very old and, like Uncle Albert in Only Fools and Horses, began many sentences with the words: “During the war…” I am often grumpy, I have dungarees, and my van is past its best. I am not a crofter, though.
All crofters are grumpy men but not all grumpy men are crofters. Or, rather, they used to be. It’s all different nowadays. The Crofting Commission is reporting surges in the numbers of women and younger people taking up the traditional way of life on a tiny farm for self-sufficiency.
What they don’t say is whether they all still wear dungarees and keep up with repairs on their tractors and vans.
A guy in our village had a tractor that always broke down. He said: “Och well, this tractor works some of the time. My last tractor was worse. It was a wooden tractor. It had wooden wheels, a wooden engine, wooden transmission, and wooden work.”
Ready for work are 500 new entrants who’ve entered crofting as a main source of income. About 45% of them are women. That is amazing. Maybe they are the archetypal battleaxes who used to be at fanks in my youth, supposedly to make the tea but who would end up shearing more sheep than their plodding husbands, who would skive by talking endlessly about their last win of £5 on Littlewoods Pools.
Nah. The report says 29 per cent of the crofting dames are aged 40 or under. What’s happening?
It seems that the ladies are quite good at it too. A few calls to crofters I know reveal that some of these millennials are regularly getting the best prizes for their sheep, cattle, and crops too.
The King famously took on role of trainee crofter
I blame the King, you know. As heir to the throne, he famously took on the role of a trainee crofter on the island of Berneray.
He was so taken with working in big wellies and driving a tractor that he went back in 1991 with TV presenter Selina Scott. She had wellies on too. They made a programme, A Prince Among Islands.
Both times, he stayed with Gloria MacKillop and her late husband, Donald Alick, known as Splash. Then a prince, Charles planted and lifted potatoes, helped with the sheep and mouthed along merrily while Splash belted out some good old Gaelic classics.
Charles later said he found crofting “inspirational.” Oh, me too, Your Majesty, but wearing wellies all the time gave me bunions. It was, he said, close to his own philosophy.
This was around the time Charles was happy to admit he often talked to plants and he thought that helped them grow. Really? No, I have not done that on our croft. That’s not crofting, that is something else altogether.
It is also something else when a top politician falls out with someone who says the government has been naughty.
A row is looming between Business Secretary Kemi Badenoch and the former Post Office chairman Henry Staunton after he claimed he was told to delay compensation payments for sub-postmasters. Really?
Mr Staunton said he was told to stall payouts to allow the government to “limp into the election,” apparently to help state finances.
So let me get this absolutely right. The sub-postmasters, who have been cleared of wrongdoing, are complaining that they are not seeing any payouts yet. And the man who would absolutely know why says its because the government is deliberately dragging its feet until after the election – in other words, for political reasons.
Ms Badenoch has quickly tried to crush what she claims is nonsense, saying the claim is “completely false” and accusing Mr Staunton of spreading “made-up anecdotes”.
Her problem is that Mr Staunton is not backing down. Quite the reverse. He is standing by his comments and says that is exactly what happened. So there. By this time next week, one of them will have apologised. That’s all I’m saying.
I am also saying that not everyone in the islands is even a trainee crofter, like the King, and not everyone understands the language of crofting.
A somewhat posh lady from Stornoway called Anne and her friend Margaret, who was brought up on a croft, were on the bus to Harris when Anne noticed some cows in a field. “What a cute bunch of cows,” says Anne. “Not a bunch, a herd,” replied Margaret. “Heard? Heard of what?” asked Anne. “Herd of cows,” said exasperated Margaret. Anne sighs: “Of course I’ve heard of cows.” “No, a cow herd,” insists Margaret.
Anne snaps: “What do I care what a cow heard? I have no secrets to keep from a cow.”
Iain Maciver is a former broadcaster and news reporter from the Outer Hebrides
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