Book slates ‘internment camp’ Hogmanay

IT IS one of Scotland’s most iconic events, with the “midnight moment” being screened to millions of television viewers around the world.

But Edinburgh’s Hogmanay has been dealt a blow after being branded one of Britain’s worst days out in a new book.

Organisers of the celebrations, which are worth some £27 million to the city’s economy, have been left furious after the book Crap Days Out slated the atmosphere at the event and claimed street party tickets cost between £50 and £90 – the Hogmanay 2011 price will be just £15.

The book claims most locals leave Edinburgh on Hogmanay to make way for an influx of overseas tourists, and claims the party on Princes Street is akin to being “stuck in a Tesco car park”.

Business and tourism leaders have also hit back at the book’s authors, freelance journalists Gareth Rubin and Jon Parker, who say they have travelled the UK researching the book.

The pair claim armed police patrol Princes Street on Hogmanay, describing it as “a giant internment camp which the council actually charges you to enter and battery hens think is cramped.”

One extract reads: “Edinburgh is an incredibly dramatic city. Built across a ravine gouged millennia ago by a migrating glacier, one side sitting atop an extinct volcano, the other a sweep of majestic Georgian townhouses, it is also sodding freezing in winter.

“Despite this, thousands of English, American and Antipodean tourists flock to the city on 31 December each year believing that the ‘atmosphere’ will keep them warm. Actually, it is the ‘atmosphere’ that makes you cold.

“The altogether lack of ambient warmth is the reason all the genuine residents of Edinburgh bugger off for the holidays, wistfully shaking their heads at the scores of misled foreigners bouncing out of the trains.”

Also featured in the book are the Teapot Island attraction in Kent, a nudist beach in Brighton, a dinosaur museum in Dorchester and Whitby’s “Dracula Experience”. The Scottish section includes the Braemar Gathering, John o’ Groats, Bannockburn battlefield and St Andrews.

Mr Parker said: “We do have some form of affection for most places in the book, but a large element of it is tongue-in-cheek.”

But Pete Irvine, director of Unique Events, producer of the Hogmanay festivities for the city council, said: “It’s an extraordinary piece of work. So much of it is completely wrong, such as the price of tickets. It’s bonkers.”

Malcolm Roughead, VisitScotland’s chief executive, said: “Edinburgh is renowned throughout the world as the home of Hogmanay celebrations, with tens of thousands of revellers flocking every year to celebrate in style.

“Last year’s event saw 137,000 people join in the four-day celebrations. More than a quarter were visitors from overseas, and it is unlikely they will share this book’s negative opinions.”