I dont personally take the view that anything Martin does is ordained by the gods of acceptability

For the sake of clarity (would that some would marshall their thoughts into some semblance of which before posting). neither do I and it's not what I said. I was merely describing his reconstruction work, something which Mary Humphreys has done similarly with floating verses. It is not the same as writing a completely new song about a subject (eg a Cornish white bunny) which has never before (as far as can be established) occurred in lyrical form before.

The Folk Awards have two categories, one for Best Traditional Track and another for Best Original Song. It should not be hard to distinguish which songs should be in which, and for the sake of the credibility of the awards and for the profile of our music in general, the process needs to be both accurate and transparent.