Latest news with #Crieff
Daily Mail
2 days ago
- Business
- Daily Mail
Police were alerted to champion bagpiper's drunk wrecking spree - by his company car!
A champion piper whose own hi-tech company car alerted police to his drunken wrecking spree has been banned from driving for 16 months. Jonathan Greenlees resigned as a company director and took a £20,000 salary cut after smashing four other cars in 30 minutes. The 51-year-old accountant, who has won world bagpiping titles, was at a company event at Crieff Hydro Hotel when he left colleagues and got in his £45,000 electric car. He caused tens of thousands of pounds worth of damage to the parked cars he smashed into and has been ordered to carry out 160 hours unpaid community work. Sheriff David Hall said: 'I cannot understand why you ended up driving your vehicle that night, bearing in mind you were staying at the hotel. Why did you drive?' Solicitor Jim Bready, defending, said: 'He has no idea. He doesn't recall driving at all. He took a chance with his vehicle being available and drinking during the meal. 'The consequences were severe for him, but fortunately not as severe as they could have been. This type of conduct is completely out of character. 'He was a company director up until this incident. After this he resigned his post and was effectively demoted to another post in the company. 'He has taken a reduction of £20,000 in his salary as a direct result of this incident. His income is substantially in excess of £60,000.' Perth Sheriff Court heard how Greenlees smashed into four other cars - including the same one twice - while he was more than three times over the limit. It was his company Polestar car which first alerted the police to him crashing while the sound of several loud bangs brought witnesses out into the street. Greenlees admitted driving dangerously and drunk while he was supposed to be staying at the Crieff Hydro Hotel in Perthshire on 14 April this year. He resigned as Finance Director of Securigroup Ltd the day after his arrest and just six months after taking up the post with the Glasgow-based company. Fiscal depute Elizabeth Hodgson told the court that the dangerous driving lasted for almost 30 minutes and was recorded in full by Greenlees' own dashcam device. She said: 'From around 11pm people in the neighbourhood and roads around Crieff heard a series of collisions and came out into the street to investigate. 'They exited their homes and found the accused sitting in the driver's seat of his vehicle, a black Polestar. Police arrived ten minutes later. 'They noticed damage to multiple vehicles and traced the accused within his vehicle and trying to start it. He was asked if he was injured and replied that he wasn't. 'He was asked to exit and it was clear he was dazed, confused and slurring his words. An ambulance attended and they assessed that he was fit for custody. 'He identified himself as the driver. The usual procedures were carried out and the accused provided a lower reading of 70 mics [limit 22 mics]. He was arrested and placed in a locked cell. 'His dashcam footage shows the entire event and lasts for about half an hour. It shows how dangerous the driving is - striking multiple vehicles, stalling and running up onto the kerb.' Mr Bready told the court his client believed he had suffered a reaction to taking medicine and alcohol during the evening and could not remember what happened. He said: 'He can't recall leaving the table, the hotel or even driving the car. He had been taking the medication for two years or longer than that and there has never been any incident where the consumption of alcohol has resulted in anything at all. 'He was going to be staying at the Crieff Hydro. He would not normally risk driving at all, having taken any drink. His colleagues told him how much he had had to drink, and it was four to five glasses of wine.' Greenlees, of Glasgow, admitted driving drunk from Crieff Hydro car park, on the A822 towards Muthill and on various other roads in Crieff on 14 April. He also admitted driving dangerously and colliding with several stationary cars, driving at excessive speed, failing to maintain lane discipline, repeatedly driving on the wrong side and striking the kerb. Greenlees was in the Field Marshall Montgomery Pipe Band when he was crowned Champion Piper at the National Mod Piping Competition in Oban in 2015. He has won numerous world titles.
The Courier
09-05-2025
- Business
- The Courier
Beautiful Pitlochry home with Tuscan themes and ‘boutique hotel feel' for sale
A beautiful Pitlochry home with Tuscan themes and the feel of a 'boutique hotel' has come up for sale. Bruadair has been transformed by its owners into a 'masterpiece', according to the agent. The home hit the headlines in 2023 when owners George and Alison Rollo saw their plans for two holiday units at the Craiglunie Gardens overturned after opposition from neighbours. The property has now been put up for sale. The focal point of the home is the open-plan living/kitchen/dining area and the adjacent snug. Agent Your Move says this space exhibits 'the finest of finishes and thoughtful design' and 'very much has the feeling throughout of being in a high-end boutique hotel'. It further says the owners have 'Italian heritage, which is obvious from Tuscan themes and a focus on open-plan, family living and opulent finishes'. The single-storey house has four bedrooms in total, three of which are en-suite. French doors in the master bedroom lead to the patio while an oversized double-height en-suite fills the Tuscan-style tower. Outside, the home features an impressive south-facing garden with panoramic views towards Ben Vrackie and a pond. The wraparound patio is the perfect space for entertaining guests on long summer nights. A double garage provides ample space for parking, while the studio would be an ideal home office. Bruadair is on the market for offers over £650,000. Elsewhere in Perthshire, one of Crieff's top bed and breakfasts is for sale after the owners announced its closure. And a 'truly spectacular'1900s Stirling mansion offering a renovation project has hit the market.
The Herald Scotland
24-04-2025
- Business
- The Herald Scotland
Crieff Hydro overhaul raises key question for hospitality
In a bold move that may ruffle feathers among the hotel's older customers, some of whom will recall the Hydro as a 'dry' destination, a striking new island bar has been installed in the heart of the traditional ballroom. Perhaps more controversially, at least for certain guests, a 'secret' speakeasy – an adults-only bar – can now be accessed from the ballroom, as long as you know the password. Its location is concealed by a bookcase wall. 'How my ancestors will be turning in their graves!' quipped Stephen Leckie, long-standing chief executive of the Crieff Family of Hotels, in an interview with The Herald. The Ballroom Bar is just one of a raft of additions designed to rejuvenate the food and drink offer for guests at the resort, following an investment totalling £5.2 million. The Leckie family will rightly be excited about the potential of their latest investment at Crieff Hydro and hope it will not only encourage frequent guests to keep coming back but convince lapsed customers to return. They may also be hoping the changes at Crieff convince people to visit the other hotels in the group's portfolio, which include Peebles Hydro and, on the west coast of Scotland, The Isle of Glencoe Hotel and The Ballachulish Hotel. The Crieff project can also, perhaps, be more widely read as evidence of the importance of hospitality businesses continually investing to refresh their offer, in order to stay relevant in an extremely competitive market. This, however, is an increasingly difficult thing to do at a time when hospitality operators face relentless pressure on costs, and household budgets continue to feel the impact of the cost of living crisis. Mr Leckie, who has routinely emphasised the importance of reinvestment over recent years, acknowledged to The Herald that it was a 'difficult time' to find the resources to invest in the current climate. But he said it was vital to 'do the right thing' for the company and its guests. Read more: He observed: 'It is a difficult time. Costs are up significantly, every cost – most recently national insurance and national minimum wage. We will feel that. 'But we have to do the right thing by the customers and our people, our staff and reinvest back into the business, and that is what we will continue to do, because we have faith in it. And that is what it boils down to – we have faith in this industry and this business and in Scotland.' Such sentiment has surely to be lauded from the perspective of raising standards in the Scottish tourism and hospitality industry, which operates in a global market. And it is certainly encouraging to see such longstanding family owners display their commitment to safeguarding the future of their business. But the difficult reality is that not every tourism and hospitality business will have the capacity to reinvest at this juncture. It will certainly not be lost on the Leckie family, who routinely reinvest profits made by their business into the fabric of their properties, that many of their counterparts will simply not have the resources to think about refurbishments or revamping their offers at the present time. In common with businesses across a raft of sectors, hospitality companies and operators will be getting to grips with the sharp increases in employer national insurance contributions and the national living and minimum wage, which came into effect this month. It has been estimated by UKHospitality that the hike in labour costs, which was brought in by Chancellor Rachel Reeves to raise much-needed cash for the public purse, will contribute significantly to a £1.9 billion increase in wage costs for the sector. The increase also reflects the lowering of business rates relief for the sector in England, to 40% from 75%. It amounts to a heavy burden for the industry at a time when economic growth is proving extremely hard to come by, particularly in light of Donald Trump's tariff wars which this week led the International Monetary Fund to slash its forecast for UK growth for this year to just 1.1%, down from 1.6% in January. Faced with a stuttering economy, and widespread concern over the potential impact of Trump tariffs, it would certainly not be surprising if the owners of many tourism and hospitality businesses decide this is not the right time to unleash investment plans. Yet, with reinvestment so critical to the ability of hotels, restaurants, and tourist attractions to keep customers coming back, it is a double-edged sword. Preserving cash to steer a business through uncertain times certainly makes a good deal of sense. But on the flip side, many business owners will only be too aware of the need to keep their offer fresh so that, when consumers do decide to part with hard-earned cash for a meal in a restaurant or weekend stay in a hotel, they are given a good reason to visit. And this matters in an international context too. It is fair to say that Scotland punches above its weight in attracting foreign visits to these shores. The most up-to-date figures from VisitScotland show 1,975,000 visits were made to Scotland by overseas residents in the first six months of 2024, up 14% on the same period of 2023 and a rise of 46% on 2019. The recovery of the international market has come as the domestic tourism sector in Scotland, which comprises tourism trips by people resident in the UK, continues to struggle amid the cost of living crisis. Vicki Miller, chief executive of VisitScotland, hammered home the importance of tourism to the country in an article in The Herald this week, writing that visitor spending creates a 'ripple effect that touches every corner of Scotland's economy'. In order for this trend to continue, consumers need good reason to keep on spending, which underlines precisely why businesses need to keep reinvesting. But it is certainly not an easy thing to do in the current climate.
