Highland Titles Day

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UPDATE 19 APRIL 2020

This blog, together with a previous one published on 29 September 2015 were the subject of defamation proceedings brought by Wildcat Haven Enterprises CIC against myself in a citation from the Court of Session served on me on 21 March 2017. Since 30 March 2017, following legal advice, the blogs have been password protected. The case (Wildcat Haven Enterprises CIC vs. Andy Wightman A111/17) was heard by Lord Clark at the Court of Session from 29 October 2019 – 8 November 2019. A Decision by Lord Clark was published on 11 March 2020 which rejected all of the pleas of the pursuer in what was a comprehensive victory for me. As a matter of law therefore neither of these two blogs are defamatory. The Pursuer issued a statement to the media on 11 March stating that “we will certainly appeal the decision”. However, the 28 day period in which to appeal has now expired and no appeal has been lodged. I am pleased therefore to now remove the password protection and enable them to be read as they were published subject to one caveat.

Lord Clark concluded that in the blogs (and a few tweets which were also complained of) I had made four untrue statements. Contrary to claims by my detractors, none of these was a lie. Indeed Lord Clark made clear that I was a “credible and reliable witness” who “gave his evidence in an honest, straightforward and coherent manner”. Lord Clark stated that “I accept his evidence about what he knew and did not know at the time of the various publications” and that “the suggestion he made statements that he knew were untrue simply has no proper basis.” [Lord Clark at 73]. I have thus edited the two blogs with a footnote marked in (red) to indicate the relevant untruths and why they arose.

Finally, what was revealed of this case in Lord Clark’s decision was a fraction of what was revealed in Court. What was revealed in Court was a fraction of the evidence assembled in the 1494 Productions (written documents lodged as evidence) lodged in the Court (59 by the Pursuer and 1435 by Defender). And what was revealed in the Productions was a fraction of what I have learned in the course of extensive preparatory research over the past 3 years about the activities of Highland Titles and Wildcat Haven Enterprises CIC. I will be publishing a detailed blog revealing what really went on over the past three years. Given the litigous nature of both parties, I will, of course, have these blogs legalled before publication.

UPDATE ENDS

I intended to have published this blog on Highland Titles Day (10 February – see Malcolm Combe’s blog) ) Apologies to those who were expecting it then.

Last September, I blogged about the latest effort by Highland Titles Ltd. to raise lots of money from people who think they get to own some land in Scotland and help conservation at the same time (see a recent advert in BBC Wildlife magazine – 1.6Mb pdf – for a flavour of their business model).

Highland Titles Ltd. is a company registered in Alderney. It is owned by Highland Titles Charitable Trust which is registered in Guernsey. See my blog of 12 Feb 2015 for further background. The company makes its money from purporting to sell small plots of land as “souvenir plots”. The controversy over the affairs of this company has been generated because no-one who buying such plots can in law become the owner of the land and because the financial affairs of the company remain opaque, being registered in a secrecy jurisdiction.

In its latest efforts to garner greater respectability, Highland Titles has become involved with a conservation project called Wildcat Haven CIC. The fundraising arm of this organisation is a Community Interest Company called Wildcat Haven Enterprises CIC with its registered office at Sage & Co Chartered Accountants in Denbighshire, North Wales. There are two Directors of the company, Emily O’Donoghue and Douglas Wilson. Mr Wilson is resident in Alderney and is also a a Director of Highland Titles Ltd (1) and a Trustee of Highland Titles Charitable Trust for Scotland.(2)

One of the requirements of a Community Interest Company is the provision of an asset lock that restricts the disposal of assets of the CIC. Assets can be transferred to another CIC or charity and such a body must be designated in the Articles of the CIC. In the case of Wildcat Haven Enterprises CIC, the designated body to become the potential recipient of the assets is Highland Titles Charitable Trust for Scotland.

In response to my September blog, Emily O’Donoghue (who is a Director of both Wildcat Haven CIC and Wildcat Haven Enterprises CIC) responded and I published the response as an update to the blog. In turn, I then posed a number of questions to Emily as follows.

  1. It may be a bit of fun but you are asking folk to help you by “actually buying part of the land we plan to conserve” You need to be much clearer that people who spend £100 do not become owners of the land.
  2. You say that part of the Loch Loyne site has been gifted to you. Can you tell me when this transaction took place and when it was submitted to the Registers of Scotland for recording? Can you advise the extent and location of this land?
  3. Are there any wildcats on the Loch Loyne land?
  4. Why is my IP address blocked from viewing your website?
  5. What is the role of Highland Titles in your fundraising? Do they receive any payment? Do they receive any commission on each plot sold?

I never received a reply but can provide an update on some of the questions.

  1. The Wildcat Haven website still contains the claim that “We are asking you to help us by actually buying part of the land we plan to conserve.”
  2. Following Emily’s claim that part of the land had been gifted “to us”, I checked the title and discovered that Highland Titles Ltd. remained the owner and had gifted no land to Wildcat Haven. Interestingly, on 9 December 2015, however, Highland Titles Ltd. made an application to the Registers of Scotland to transfer part of Paitna Wood/BumbleBee Haven/Wildcat Haven to Wildcat Haven Enterprises CIC.
  3. No response.
  4. No response.
  5. No response.

It remains unclear what financial arrangements have been entered into and why Douglas Wilson is a Director and why Highland Titles Charitable Trust for Scotland is the designated beneficiary of the assets of Wildcat Haven Enterprises CIC.

As I pointed out in my September blog, if all of the 75 hectares of Paitna Wood/BumbleBee Haven/Wildcat Haven/Wildernesse Wood were sold even as 10 square foot plots, this would generate £40.35 million in sales revenue paid to a company in Alderney in the Channel Islands. In normal circumstances, a conservation project would be established as a charity and a trading body or fundraising enterprise would be established as a whole owned subsidiary of the charity. There’s a lot of money at stake.

Most recently, Wildcat Haven has been seeking to become involved in the community acquisition of a Forestry Commission forest by Loch Arkaig.

Finally, a very significant development took place in early June 2015.

Highland Title’s bankers and corporate service providers in Guernsey gave notice of the termination of their services.

Wildcat Haven Enterprises CIC was incorporated in 30 June 2015.

UPDATE FOOTNOTE 19 APRIL 2020

(1) Douglas Wilson in fact was not a Director of WHE at the time of publication of this Blog. He was a Director of Wildcat Enterprises CIC from 6 June 2015 to 21 August 2015 (when he resigned) and again from 21 October 2015 until 17 February 2016 when he again resigned. Guernesy does not have a very transparent, publicly accessible registry of companies being one of the most secretive jurisdictions in the world. Thius, in order to obtain information about when a Director was appointed or resigned, one has to contact the Registry with a specific request. As with my research for Blog 1 in September 2015, I phoned the Registry to find out if Douglas Wilson was still a Director of WHE and was informed that he was. Critically, as noted in the first sentence of this Blog, I had intended to publish it on Highland Titles Day, 10 February and had by then completed all of my research including this call to the Registry. For reasons I cannot recall (although I was very busy with the forthcoming Holyrood election and my partner was abroad in India) I did not publish the Blog until 24 February 2020 by which time Douglas WIlson had resigned as a Director of Highland Titles Ltd. It was thus an oversight on my part not to have checked the whole Blog for any factual matters that might have changed between 10 February 2016 and the date of publication.

(2) Douglas Wilson was in fact not a Director of Highland Titles Charitable Trust for Scotland at the time of the publication of this Blog. Unlike the Guernsey Registry of Companies (see footnote (1) above), the Registry of Charities is publicly available online. I checked the entry for HTCTS during research for the Blog and noted that Douglas Wilson was recorded as a Director of HTCTS. I therefore relied upon this official source in good faith in writing the Blog. In fact, Douglas WIlson had resigned as a Director of HTCTS on 6 July 2015. This was not reported in the Guernsey Registry of charities until an update was published on 20 June 2016.