Expand the boundaries!

Why the contribution is important

This is important because the current boundary system doesnt reflect how rural communities function. It creates an uneven and illogical distribution of community benefit , where tiny settlements continually get access to large amounts of funding , while the alightly larger towns they use for goods and services receive nothing and are left competing for overstretched national funding. Many communities that sit within the boundaries have benefited from this funding for years and many lack the capacity, land access or asset base to use the funds meaningfully. The mismatch caused leads to inefficiency and missed opportunities to support places where investment could have a greater impact.
Including hub towns in the schemes would

  1.  Support equitable rural development- ensuring funding reaches the places most used by the wider population
  2. Strengthen regional resilience - as strong service towns underpin the wellbeing of all surrounding villages, and keeping them functioning is beneficial to all.
  3. Enable meaningful investment - these towns often have the assets and infrastructure that can absorb and benefit from funding
  4. Reflect real community use patterns - not arbitrary mapped boundaries. Throughout history rural areas have had a larger town be the hub of smaller settlements and villages, where they would take their produce and animals to sell, socialise, shop and be involved with the community. These are the towns that need investment now, to prevent further migration to the cities, encourage jobs locally, and continue community spirit.

by LCDT2009 on February 23, 2026 at 04:36PM

Current Rating

Average rating: 3.9
Based on: 13 votes

Comments

  • Posted by smithm31 February 24, 2026 at 11:39

    The existing boundary system does not accurately reflect how rural communities function in practice. Small settlements are not isolated units; they depend on nearby service towns for employment, healthcare, education, shopping and social infrastructure. Funding models that focus solely on tightly drawn geographic proximity risk creating uneven and inefficient outcomes.

    Including hub towns within community benefit arrangements would better reflect real patterns of community use and rural interdependence. Strong service towns underpin the wellbeing of surrounding villages. If those towns decline due to lack of investment, the impact is felt across the wider rural area.
    A more flexible or tiered boundary approach could ensure that host communities continue to benefit while also recognising the role of regional centres. This would support equitable rural development, strengthen regional resilience, and enable funding to be invested where it can deliver meaningful and sustainable impact.
    Community benefit policy should reflect how rural Scotland actually works, as connected networks, rather than relying solely on administrative or mapped boundaries.

  • Posted by muriestoncommunity February 24, 2026 at 17:15

    Totally agree with comment above. The current system in some areas, of using Community Council administrative areas for distribution of community benefit does not always reflect the urban areas adjacent to developments. A more zoned approach based on distance from a development, the visibility of the development and the population within these areas is a fairer system.

  • Posted by hnoj5591 March 09, 2026 at 07:58

    Our rural community doesn't really have space for a wind farm, not that we desperately want one. So we are dependant on small amounts of money from wind farms in neighbouring communities, who are struggling to spend their money. It has elements of a post-code lottery. It doesn't encourage joint projects when one side feels that it is contributing most of the money.

    So I would support a mechanism for spreading the income more evenly, although I cannot think what this might be. If Scotland is energy-rich (which I am not sure is true), it should feel more uniformly rich, not islands of decadence in a sea of poverty.

  • Posted by lossiemouthcdt March 09, 2026 at 15:15

    There has been talk for a long time of a regional fund, whereby towns and communities that do not fall into the boundaries can apply for a portion of the funding.

    If each scheme paid a percentage into a regional or national pot, then those who do not have a neighbouring scheme can still benefit.

    Our community is not eligible geographically as an area of benefit as we have an RAF base which prohibits wind turbines nearby. We desperately need core funding for our development trust to support our ongoing community work, this could make a huge difference to us.

  • Posted by lossiemouthcdt March 09, 2026 at 15:15

    There has been talk for a long time of a regional fund, whereby towns and communities that do not fall into the boundaries can apply for a portion of the funding.

    If each scheme paid a percentage into a regional or national pot, then those who do not have a neighbouring scheme can still benefit.

    Our community is not eligible geographically as an area of benefit as we have an RAF base which prohibits wind turbines nearby. We desperately need core funding for our development trust to support our ongoing community work, this could make a huge difference to us.

  • Posted by shonarosehall March 16, 2026 at 12:48

    No to expanding boundaries. The communities that are suffering the most should be compensated the most.
    Expanding the boundaries would result in more people unaffected by the damage these developments do to rural communities, the ecology and the environment voting for these developments for financial reasons. Rural communities and the most scenically beautiful, wildlife rich and biodiverse parts of the country will continue to be completely destroyed and turned into industrial wastelands if our government is allowed to make more money to put in to urban problems at the expense of our rural areas yet again.
    Industrial scale renewable developments should be close to the end users on existing brownfield sites for both ecological / environmental reasons and economical. There will be no natural environment left the way they are going at present.

  • Posted by Clephan March 17, 2026 at 09:17

    Guidance should be much clearer and quantified on who gets what fraction. Without clear guidance communities are pitted against each other to "negotiate" their share with the high likelihood of conflict.

  • Posted by Insight26 March 18, 2026 at 16:29

    Agree that boundaries should be expanded so that local geographical hubs can benefit also, and that the way the distribution works currently contributes to massive inequalities. Say expand to 10 kilometres from nearest turbine. Benefits should be distributed on population basis within that boundary. There should be space for exceptions/flexibility where a wider boundary makes sense.

    It would be possible also to top slice the funds and make the slice regional.

    Another possibility would be to distribute CBF so that any per household sum (equivalent) is not above a certain proportion of the total CBF coming in to that settlement/village say 1%. There could be thresholds. say 1% if CBF is up to 1/2 million per year; 0.5% if total CBF is above that.

  • Posted by LanarkCharity March 19, 2026 at 15:23

    The tight boundaries cause issues and fail on transformation for rural areas.
    Its completely appropriate that the communities closest to the windfarm receive priority and or the majority of funds however there needs to be encouragement to think wider and "regionally" still with a rural focus.

    Small villages need small towns

    The guidance should encourage regional funds and set a maximum that can go into rural funds.
    I would think 30% to a broader Regional fund or flexibility up to that would have transformational change in areas like S Lanarkshire.

    We have experience where developers didn't talk to all the communities within a 10k area and some communities on the 8 - 9kilometer lost out.

  • Posted by tkcc March 25, 2026 at 18:29

    Torridon and Kinlochewe Community Council supports the suggestion of expanding the boundaries of areas of benefit. The most benefit must absolutely go to those most impacted by infrastructure but in remote rural communities the current 30-mile radius can feel like quite an arbitrary line. Recognition must also be given to the grid infrastructure which runs through many communities across the Highlands.

    The current system creates stark inequalities between those that receive community benefits and those that don't and does little to recognise the interconnectedness of rural communities and the area wide issues that are making communities increasingly fragile.

    We suggest a sliding scale approach to distribution, whereby communities experiencing the most direct negative impacts continue to receive the greatest share but that all remote rural communities receive some level of benefit. This is because the natural resources that are used for renewable energy are shared resources and because remote communities suffer disproportionately from lack of services. Key criteria for determining how much remote communities should receive could be such things as lack of public transport, no primary school, high risks of power cuts, or roads being cut off due to storms. This would help communities implement Community Action Plans, Local Place Plans and resilience planning.

    Consideration could also be given to smaller urban centres, recognising their role in providing essential services to surrounding rural areas. However, any such allocation should be guided by clear, transparent criteria, and care should be taken to ensure that resources are not absorbed by larger urban areas.
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