A PENSIONER who entered a raffle in the hope of winning a £1.5 million Arran estate claims her chance was taken away after the terms of the competition were changed.

Margaret Robinson, from Saltcoats, bought two £55 tickets in the Scottish Island Dream Estate Raffle last year.

As the Herald reported previously, James L Clark, owner of Balmichael Centre near Shiskine, had decided to raffle off the property for the humanitarian charity Boots on the Ground (BOTG).

But BOTG, which organised the raffle, recently announced that due to a lack of ticket sales, the estate would no longer be offered as a prize. Instead, the charity chose a winner at random and offered them an undisclosed cash prize.

Margaret says that she was not notified of the change and only heard about it after reading an article in the national press. The 65-year-old told the Herald: “I bought two tickets in the raffle, over £50 each. My husband said to me: ‘You bought two tickets, you’re aff yer heid!’ but it was a wee dream.

“I never win these things but it’s a dream – I can see Arran from my house and I imagined being over there. I’m not going to get a chance now.

“Now they’ve just decided that the winner will instead pocket half the takings. That’s not the deal I signed up for. The deal was that there was a big winner. There was no notification and they’re not saying what number of tickets were sold or anything.

“You don’t expect to win something like that but it’s just taken that chance away from me.

“I phoned up the phone number and it was no longer in service. They might have announced something online but not everyone’s on the internet – I’m not on the internet – but the guy’s a millionaire, surely he has secretaries or some way of contacting us?

“I thought at the time: ‘I’ll spend my birthday money on a couple of tickets’. I’d have been as well giving it to a charity.”

Deborah Adams, volunteer at BOTG, said: “The raffle was never cancelled, nor was the Isle of Arran property withdrawn from consideration until the raffle itself officially ended on June 1, 2017, when it proceeded as required by law. Per the official rules, an alternative cash prize was indeed awarded to a randomly chosen ticket holder because the reserve was not met.

“The official rules, along with detailed FAQs, were published and have been available to the public since October 2016, the details of which were also noted in countless newspapers and articles worldwide.

“While the Isle of Arran property will not be offered again by its owners, Boots on the Ground will continue to offer new prizes through the Island Raffle as a fundraiser to support our humanitarian mission and charitable activities.”