The richest man in Scotland is Dutch?
Sunday, August 20 2006
Dutch Billionaire Donates £100,000 to Gaelic College
Oil and gas magnate Paul van Vlissingen owns the 60,000 acre Letterewe estate (right) in Wester Ross. The Letterewe Estate is located on the North side of Loch Maree opposite the Beinn Eighe Nature Reserve. Paul van Vlissingen is estimated to be the richest man in Scotland. In previous years, he has donated £150,000 in the form of scholarships to Sabhal Mor Ostaig, the Gaelic college at Sleat on the Isle of Skye. Now suffering from terminal cancer, the businessman has donated a further £100,000 to the college. His spokesman says that Mr van Vlissingen is using the time he has left to concentrate on the good times, with family and friends.
The full story can be found here
The donation from Paul van Vlissingen comes at exactly the right moment according to the following information:
Scotland's first ever National Plan for Gaelic, aimed at increasing daily use of the language and promoting its development, has gone out for public consultation. The last census showed that only around 90,000 people in Scotland could speak the language, out of a population of 5 million. The Gaelic Language (Scotland) Act 2005, which came into force in February, set up a statutory Gaelic Development Agency - Bòrd na Gàidhlig - that will organise consultation meetings on the plan. There are suggested priorities and measures for the further development of Gaelic, including the way forward for public bodies in the production of Gaelic plans, as required by the act.







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