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Book now: Scottish Agri Hacks Burns Supper 2020

By 27th October 2019July 27th, 2023No Comments
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Scottish Agri Hacks Burns Supper

Ballathie House Hotel

Saturday, 25 January 2020

The Scottish Agri Hacks Burns Supper – organised by the Scottish committee of the British Guild of Agricultural Journalists – has gone from strength-to-strength since its revival in 2017 and has been greatly enjoyed by Guild members and guests from the Scottish farming community over the past three years.

Arrangements for the 2020 event have now been finalised and we can look forward to another highly enjoyable evening paying tribute to Scotland’s national bard, Robert Burns, in the relaxed company of friends and colleagues.

A superlative four-course dinner is promised with lots of banter, fun and laughter, plus sparkling entertainment from a stellar cast of talents largely drawn from within our own membership.

They include the irrepressible Ken Fletcher (Address to the Haggis), the revered Fordyce Maxwell (Immortal Memory), the fun-loving Arthur Anderson (Toast to the Lasses), RSABI chief executive, Nina Clancy (Reply to the Toast to the Lasses), with Burns songs from the new Mrs Fletcher (alias Fiona Sloan), and Burns poems from Jim McLaren (the new chairman of NFU Mutual), all held together with his usual aplomb and humour by our chairman for the evening, the Provost of Aberdeenshire, Councillor Bill Howatson.

The venue is the Ballathie House Hotel (pictured above) at Stanley, near Perth, who have looked after us so well over the past three years and the date is Saturday, 25 January 2020.

With continued support from our sponsors (ABP Perth, QMS and NFU Mutual), we have managed to keep the cost down to the same as last year which works out at £99 per person, including a pre-dinner drinks reception, four-course dinner (including drink for the toast) and bed and breakfast on a shared room basis in the hotel, or £45 per person if you don’t wish to stay overnight.

Some concern has been expressed in the past about the cost for the younger fraternity and the hotel has kindly agreed to offer a special reduced rate of £79 per person on a shared room basis for dinner and bed and breakfast in the adjoining Sportman’s Lodge.

In addition, for those who may want to make a week-end of it, the hotel is offering a special rate of £45 per person sharing for bed and breakfast on the Friday night (24 January) or £37.50 per person sharing in the Sportsman’s Lodge.

A supplement of £25 will apply for single occupancy both in the main hotel and the lodge. A non-refundable deposit payment of 25% will be requested at time of booking.

If you wish to attend, please advise Eddie Gillanders at eddie@farmnortheast.co.uk as soon as possible with the names of your party (for the table plan) and also if any members of your party have any special dietary requirements.

All payments, including dinner, should be made directly to the hotel.

Please book directly with the hotel if you require accommodation (01250 883268) quoting the reference, Gillanders, to ensure you get the negotiated rates (but not be charged to the person of that name!).

We hope you can join us for a fun evening and look forward to hearing from you. If you have any queries, please contact Eddie or speak to one of the other members of the organising committee: Jane Craigie, Andrew Arbuckle, Ewan Pate, Gemma Mackenzie or Ken Fletcher.