Fellow's under strain, and welcomes middlemen describing government grant, maybe (5,6)
I believe the answer is:
means tested
'government grant maybe' is the definition.
I can't judge whether this defines the answer.
'fellow's under strain and welcomes middlemen' is the wordplay.
'fellow' becomes 'ed' (short for Edward).
'under' says to put letters next to each other (in a down clue, some letters go below others).
'strain' becomes 'test'.
'and' means one lot of letters go next to another.
'welcomes middlemen' becomes 'means' (I can't explain this - if you can you should believe this answer much more).
'ed' put after 'test' is 'tested'.
'tested' put after 'means' is 'MEANS TESTED'.
'describing' is the link.
Can you help me to learn more?