YHAgroup.org.uk

A short report in Thursday’s Guardian appears to be the first appearance in the national press of an issue that been showing up in local papers up and down the country. YHA’s application for 24-hour drink and entertainment licences for many of its hostels has made the news in…

• Alfriston
• Cambridge
• Cockermouth
• St Briavels
• Newcastle
• Saffron Walden

All have made some effort to obtain and express the YHA’s side of the story, but I suspect many readers will still be getting the wrong impression of the Association. Unfortunately, the YHA appears to operate a “good news only” policy on it’s news and press web pages - stories which aren’t 100% positive are left to third parties to explain, with whatever inaccuracies and distortions they introduce. So, in the absence of anything from Matlock, I’m going add to the ranks of those third parties (remember this is NOT an official YHA site) and give the story as I understand it, largely based on a briefing given to Central Regional Council last weekend.

Continue reading…

The YHA has been awarded fifth place in the Best UK Hotel category of the 2007 Observer Travel Awards (an improvement on seventh place last year). This is a tremendous achievement, especially when you consider that the other four nominees in the top five are luxury hotel chains charging three figure sums for a night’s accommodation.

The awards are made as a result of 13,500 questionnaires completed by Observer and Guardian readers who were asked to rate their holiday experiences. Clearly many of them loved their experience of the YHA, let’s hope the appearance of youth hostelling in a list dominated by five star luxury inspires other readers to give it a try.

You might no longer get a welcoming cup of tea, but if you’re after something stronger that won’t be a problem. Eastbourne Today reports that YHA has applied for a 24 hour entertainment and alcohol licence for Alfriston YH. They won’t be able to provide food after 5am though, so keep that dial-a-kebab leaflet handy.

Colin Rich, YHA’s food and beverage manager, deploys some impressive legalese to explain that YHA doesn’t really want to sell booze all night every night, but just wants to be legally in the clear for any special events that might be hosted at the hostel. At least I think that’s what he’s trying to say - whether it’s the message the the burghers of Eastbourne will get is another matter.

The scheme to open a youth hostel in Ulverston has moved a step closer to fruition, according to the North-West Evening Mail. Plans for the £3m project to convert Ford House into a four-star youth hostel have been completed and will now go before South Lakeland District Council’s planners.

The tricky step will be to raise the funding - to be sought from the council and also from the Heritage Lottery Fund. The Lottery aren’t expected to come to a decision before March 2008, so there’s still a long way to go.

Still, let’s hope the Ford Park Community Group pull this one off. It might go some way to fill the gap opened by the apparent closure of Duddon Estuary YH earlier this year.

It’s not often that the youth hostel movement gets 20 minutes’ discussion on national radio (well, national to Scotland anyway), so I thought I’d preserve Wednesday’s coverage in the form of a transcript. Scotland Live airs every weekday lunchtime on Radio Scotland and is presented by Mhairi Stuart, here’s what they had to say about hostel closures… Continue reading…

The projected closure of seven SYHA hostels has attracted some attention in the media. As well as several letters written to The Herald and a report on the BBC News website, the story was featured at length on Radio Scotland’s Scotland Live programme yesterday.

For the next six days you can “listen again” to the whole programme, the report begins about 24 minutes in and includes an interview with Keith Legge, Chief Executive of SYHA, a report from Killin about the feared effect of the hostel closing there, and a talk with Marilyn Barrack of the Elenydd Trust about how they saved T’yn Cornel and Dolgoch and whether the same apporach might work in Scotland. The whole report lasts 20 minutes and besides the odd gag about “bobble hats” gives the whole issue a fair going over.

Viewed from south of the border, the whole situation seems sadly familiar. In many a YHA common room you’ll hear Scotland described as the promised land, where the wily old SYHA have resisted the temptation to excessively “do up” their hostels and kept the sacred flame of simple hostelling alive. Well, now it seems that the Scots are meeting the same problems as the rest of us, coming up with some of the same solutions, resulting in the same response from the membership. We can only wait to see what happens next.

The Office of the Scottish Charity Regulator (OSCR), Scotland’s charity watchdog, has begun a review of SYHA’s charitable status, according to The Herald. This will form part of an ongoing review of all Scotland’s charities following some recent scandals in the sector. Why pick on the SYHA?

The newly created OSCR decided to prioritise its task of vetting all 23,500 charities by concentrating first on those where there was “risk” or uncertainty as to their status.

Independent schools, care homes and universities [and hostel associations too, presumably] could fall foul of the legislation - and therefore lose valuable tax breaks - if their fees are deemed to be “unduly restrictive”.

As it only costs up to £8 per year to join the SYHA, and non-members can stay at their hostels for a mere £1 per night extra, they shouldn’t have too much to worry about on that score. Still, a renewed focus on their charitable status shouldn’t do them any harm.

South of the border, it should be noted, the recent AGM called on “all parts of the  YHA community to renew their commitment to YHA’s charitable object”. Perhaps they ought to make that call more vocal?

Just in case you thought mass hostel closures only happened south of the border, the SYHA have announced the closure of seven of their 53 hostels. The decision follows an 18-month “Hostel Network and Management Review”, and was approved on Sunday. According to the SYHA site (my emphasis):

Hostels marked for closure are: Armadale, Coldingham, Glendevon, Inverey, Killin, Kyleakin and Loch Lochy. In addition a storage facility in Stirling, a plot of land in Cargen, a disused building in Cannich and a former hostel in Whiting Bay will be sold. A review of the Hostel Services and HR functions in the SYHA’s National Office will also take place as part of the restructure.

It is anticipated that the recommendations will be implemented in phases with Phase 1 of the restructure in place by February 2008 and Phase 2 by February 2009.

The closure of Coldingham has already led to a report on the BBC News website. No doubt there’ll be further protests in the press and at the SYHA’s AGM next Saturday.

If any of these hostels is one of your (or your group’s) favourites, it’s time to start plotting a final visit…

A long report in the Northern Echo profiles Blackton Grange Development Centre - formerly known as Baldersdale Youth Hostel until its closure last year. The hostel was closed because of falling visitor numbers and the need for investment, the new owners have provided plenty of the latter: £55,000 spent so far, with a further £200,000 to come.

Inside, the centre still has the familiar bunk beds but with new bedding and fluffy towels in freshly painted rooms. [...] Meals are eaten in the blue painted kitchen dining room, complete with its original red quarry tiles from its days as a farm. Downstairs, the lounge has been repainted in cosy reds, the perfect accompaniment to the huge stone fireplace which keeps the room warm during the harsh Teesdale winters. It has a flat screen television in one corner

This plush new resting place on the Pennine Way is primarily aimed at the corporate market - teams of jaded executives learning teamwork skills by heading for the outdoors and being rained on together. The 37-bedded hostel has to be booked in its entirety, so it’s no longer really open to individual hostellers. However, the £750 price tag for a weekend in the off season may be attractive to some of the larger YHA groups looking for somewhere different.

The Blackton Grange website has full details of the place for anybody seeking further information.

A group of environmentally minded Londoners are attempting to save Ivinghoe youth hostel, according to a report in Hemel Hempstead Today. Their intention is to convert part of the hostel into an environmentally friendly communal living area, whilst retaining the rest of it as a hostel. A scheme to make a reality TV show about the whole enterprise has (mercifully) been shelved.

Plans are “still in the very early stages” (they’d better get a move on as the place closes at the end of September!), so it is not known whether the putative hostel would remain in the YHA network or not.